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BURT  FRANKLIN:  RESEARCH  AND  SOURCE  WORKS  SERIES 
(AMERICAN  CLASSICS  IN  HISTORY  AND  SOCIAL  SCIENCE  #16) 


MISCELLANEOUS 


WORKS 

VOL  1 


MISCELLANEOUS 


WORKS 


HENRY  C.  CAREY,  LL.D., 

AUTHOR   OF    "  PRINCIPLES   OF    SOCIAL    8CIBNCR,"    ETC.   ETC. 

VOL  1 

BURT  FRANKLIN:  RESEARCH  AND  SOURCE  WORKS  SERIES  #133 
(AMERICAN  CLASSICS  IN  HISTORY  AND  SOCIAL  SCIENCE  #16) 


BURT  FRANKLIN 
NEW  YORK 


Published  By 
BURT  FRANKLIN 

235  East  44th  St. 
New  York,  N.Y.  10017 


ORIGINALLY  PUBLISHED 
PHILADELPHIA:    1883 


Printed  in  U.S.A. 


THE 


HARMONY  OF  INTERESTS, 


AGRICULTURAL,  MANUFACTURING, 


AXE 


COMMERCIAL. 


BY   HENRY   C.   CAREY. 


PHILADELPHIA: 
HENRY     CAREY     BAIRD, 

INDUSTRIAL    PUBLISHER, 
406    WALNUT    STREET. 

1872. 


PREFACE, 


THE  tsndency  of  the  whole  British  system  of  political  economy  is  to  the  production 
of  discord  among  men  and  nations.  It  is  based  upon  the  Ricardo  and  Malthusian  doc- 
trines of  rent  and  population,  which  teach  that  men  every  where  commence  the  work  of 
cultivation  on  the  rich  soils  of  the  earth,  and  that,  when  population  is  small,  food  is 
abundant ;  but  that  as  numbers  increase,  men  are  forced  to  resort  to  poorer  soils,  yielding 
steadily  less  and  less  in  return  to  labor.  As  a  necessary  consequence  of  the  increasing 
scarcity  of  fertile  soils,  it  is  held  that  with  this  diminishing  return,  the  land-holder  is 
enabled  to  take  a  larger  proportion  of  the  proceeds  of  labor,  thus  profiting  at  the  cost 
of  the  laborer,  and  by  reason  of  tl.e  same  causes  which  tend  to  the  gradual  subjugation 
of  the  latter  to  the  will  of  his  master.  Here  are,  of  course,  lying  at  the  very  founda- 
tion of  the  system,  discordant  interests,  and  this  discord  is  found  in  every  succeed- 
ing portion  of  it.  Over-populaHon  is  held  to  be  a  result  of  a  great  law  of  nature,  in 
virtue  of  which  men  grow  in  numbers  faster  than  can  grow  the  food  that  is  to  nourish 
them;  and  the  poverty,  vice, and  crime  that  everywhere  exist,  are  regarded  as  necessary 
consequences  of  this  great  law,  emanating  from  an  all-wise,  all-powerful,  and  all  merci- 
ful Being.  War,  famine,  and  pestilence  are  regarded  as  means  provided  by  that  Being 
for  restraining  population  within  the  limits  of  subsistence.  Charity  is  regarded  as 
almost  a  crime,  because  it  tends  to  promote  the  growth  of  population.  The  landlord 
excuses  himself  for  taking  large  rents,  on  the  ground  that  it  is  a  necessary  consequence  of 
the  natural  tendency  of  man  to  increase  in  numbers  with  too  great  rapidity.  The  stock- 
holder of  the  East  India  Company,  who  luxuriates  upon  the  produce  of  his  stock, 
regards  it  as  one  of  the  natural  consequences  of  this  great  law  that  he  should  receive,  as 
rent,  so  large  a  portion  of  the  proceeds  of  labor  applied  to  cultivation,  as  to  leave  to 
the  poor  cultivator  but  half  a  dollar  per  month  out  of  which  to  supply  himself  and  his 
family  with  food,  raiment,  and  shelter;  and  excuses  himself  to  his  conscience,  on  the 
ground  that  it  is  a  necessary  result  of  great  natural  laws.  Capital  cannot  become  more 
productive,  except  at  the  cost  of  labor ;  nor  can  wages  rise,  except  at  the  cost  of  capital. 

Among  the  consequences  of  this  great  law  of  discords,  promulgated  by  Malthus  and 
Ricatdo,  is  found  the  idea  that,  if  men  would  prosper,  they  must  live  apart  from  each 
o'her.  The  rich  lands  of  England  are,  as  it  is  said,  already  occupied,  ajnd  those  who  would 
find  rich  lands  must  fly  to  America  or  to  Australia,  there  to  produce  food  and  raw 
materials  wit.h  which  to  supply  the  market  of  England ;  and  thus  it  is  that  that  country 
seeks  to  establish  a  system  of  commercial  centralization,  that  is — as  was  so  justly  said, 
seventy  years  since,  by  Adam  Smith — a  manifest  violation  of  "the  most  sacred  rights  of 
mankind."  That  great  man  was  fully  possessed  of  the  fact  that,  if  the  farmer  or  planter 
would  flourish,  he  must  bring  the  consumer  to  his  side ;  and  that  if  the  artisan  would 


IV  PREPACK. 

flourish,  he  must  seek  to  locate  himself  in  the  place  where  the  raw  materials  wer«  grown, 
and  aid  the  farmer  by  converting  them  into  the  forms  fitting  them  for  the  use  of  men, 
and  thus  facilitating  their  transportation  to  distant  lands.  He  saw  well,  that  when  men 
came  thus  together,  there  arose  a  general  harmony  of  interests,  each  profiting  his  neigh- 
bor, and  profiting  by  that  neighbor's  success,  whereas  the  tendency  of  commercial  cen- 
tralization was  toward  poverty  and  discord,  abroad  and  at  home.  The  object  of  pro- 
tection among  ourselves  is  that  of  aiding  the  farmers  in  the  effort  to  bring  consumers 
to  their  sides,  and  thus  to  carry  into  effect  the  system  advocated  by  the  great  author  of 
The  Wealth  of  Nations,  while  aiding  in  the  annihilation  of  a  system  that  has  ruined 
Ireland,  India,  Portugal,  Turkey,  and  all  other  countries  subject  to  it ;  and  the  object  of 
the  following  chapters  is  that  of  showing  why  it  is  that  protection  is  needed ;  how  it 
operates  in  promoting  the  prosperity  of,  and  harmony  among,  the  various  portions  of 
society ;  and  how  certain  it  is  that  THE  TRUE,  THE  PROFITABLE,  AND  THE  ONLY  MEANS  OF 
ATTAINING  PERFECT  FREEDOM  OF  TRADE,  is  to  be  found  in  that  efficient  protection  which 
shall  fully  and  completely  carry  out  the  doctrine  of  Dr.  Smith,  in  bringing  the  loom  and 
the  anvil  to  take  their  natural  places  by  the  side  of  the  plough  and  the  barrow. 


INDEX. 


ADVANTAGE  of  bringing  machinery  to  the  cot- 
ton, page  145. 

African  cotton,  attempts  to  raise,  174. 

Agricultural  labour  in  England,  155. 

Americans  responsible  for  the  wars  of  Eng- 
land, 197. 

BALTIMQRB  and  Ohio  railroad  tolls,  24. 

and  Ohio  railroad  tolls,  diagram  of, 

35. 

Brazil,  supply  of  cotton  from,  170. 

British  commerce  ruinous  to  Ireland  and  In- 
dia, 71. 

efforts  to  underwork  all  other  nations, 

54. 

imports  and  exports,  56. 

legislation  upon  imports  and  exports, 

53. 

slave  history  disgraceful,  169. 

system  and  protection  contrasted,  72. 

causes  poverty  in  the  producer,  101. 

endeavours  to  maintain  monopoly  of 

machinery,  101. 

Bullion  and  specie  should  be  included  in  Ta- 
riff tables,  7. 

CANADA  and  Cuba,  objections  to  their  annexa- 
tion, 62. 

.........  form  of  its  commerce,  99. 

ruined  by  free  trade,  99. 

Canadian  desire  for  annexation,  62. 

desire  for  annexation,  its  cause,  99. 

exports,  91. 

independence  would  stop  immigration 

in  the  United  States,  73. 

produce  sent  to  England,  22. 

Capital  and  labour  wasted  in  transportation, 
146. 

who  suffers  by  its  waste,  192. 

Capitalist,  how  affected  by  protection,  141. 

small,  ruined  by  fluctuations  occasioned 

by  the  British  system,  199. 

Cheap  labour,  130. 

China,  manufacture  of,  26. 

Chinese  system  of  trade,  134. 

Clothing,  power  to  obtain,  in  exchange  for 
labour,  16,  40. 

power  to  obtain,  increases  under  pro- 
tection, 16. 

price  of,  is  really  very  high,  111. 

Coal,  consumption  of,  13,  33. 

rate  of  its  consumption  under  the  Tariff 

of  1828,  85. 

i price  of,  reduced  with  increased  pro- 
duction, 14. 

production  and  consumption  of,  in- 
crease and  diminish  together,  14. 


Coffee,  consumption  of,  28,  38. 

abolition  of  duties  on,  30. 

Colonial  system  presents  combination  of  ac- 
tion, 95. 

system  depresses  theprice  of  cotton,  99. 

manufactures,  object  of  prohibiting, 

131. 

Colonies  of  England,  their  consumption  of  cot- 
ton, 110.  . 

Colonization,  British  system  of,  64. 

Combination  diminished  by  emigration,  94. 

impossible  in  a  state  of  poverty,  87. 

increases  population,  88. 

increases  value  of  labour,  86. 

needed  in  this  country,  52. 

of  labour,  strikes,  <fec.,  161. 

Commercial  policy,  review  of  our,  10. 

Commerce  decreases  under  free  trade,  73. 

definition  of,  67. 

increases  under  protection,  72. 

internal,  23. 

power  to  maintain  external,  39. 

power  to  maintain  internal,  39. 

tends  to  produce  equality  of  condition, 

153. 

Communism  among  nations  produced  by  po- 
licy of  England,  154. 

Compromise  Act,  3. 

its  operation,  5. 

Concentration  needed  to  make  labour  produc- 
tive,' 89. 

Condition  of  English  people,  154. 

of  man  improved  by  increase  of  pro- 
ductive power,  78. 

Consumer  should  live  near  the  farmer,  96. 

Consumption  equals  production,  45. 

grows  with  power  of  production,  23. 

of  foreign  products  decreases  under 

free  trade,  42. 

not  arrested  by  high  prices,  116. 

power  of,  decreases  as  the  producers 

are  more  and  more  distant  from  mar- 
ket, 87. 

Conversion  and  exchange,  doctrine  of,  46. 

how  maintained  in  England,  63. 

increases  man's  necessities,  and  di- 
minishes his  powers,  1S3. 

tends  to  destroy  labour  and  capital, 

150. 

Cotton,  comparative  consumption  of,  under  pro- 
tection and  free  trade,  110,  114. 

comparative  prices  of  crop  and  cotton 

goods  in  Liverpool,  from  1843  t« 
1847,  137. 

decrease  in  its  cultivation,  103. 

decrease  in  its  price,  114. 

diagram  of  imports  of  foreign,  36. 


vi 


INDEX. 


Cotton,  does  not  increase  in  supply  for  want  of 

a  market,  121. 

fluctuations  in  price  of,  116. 

production  of  the  world,  59. 

Prussian  imports  of,  before  the  Zollve- 

rein,  107. 

return  for,  consumed  in  England,  58. 

.........  statement  of  crop  and  consumption  of 

American,  106. 

speculation  in  India  a  failure,  111. 

supply  of,  to  Britain  falling  off,  179. 

trade  between  the  United  States  and 

England,  114. 

weekly  consumption  of,  in  Great  Bri- 
tain, 175. 

where  the  best  is  raised,  105. 

goods,  110. 

...    ...  goods  and  yarn  exported  to  India  from 

England,  103. 
and  twist,  prices  from  1844  to  1848, 

117. 

consumption  of,  15,  33. 

consumption  of,  under  free  trade,  and 

under  protection,  16. 

dearest  when  cotton  is  lowest,  117. 

import  of,  15. 

.........  imported  into  Canada  from  England, 

99. 

Credit,  public,  31,  39. 
Cultivator,  his  gradual  operations  with  the 

land,  123. 
Currency,  how  affected  by  protection,  185. 

DEBT  created  by  importations,  26. 

foreign,  37. 

public,  31,  38. 

Dependence  on  England  a  cause  of  non-con- 
sumption of  iron,  83. 

Depopulation,  present  tendency  to,  20. 

diagram  of,  34. 

Disasters  of  1836  to  1842,  how  produced,  188. 

present  tendency  to,  189. 

Duties  of  the  United  States,  227. 

Duty  affects  amount  of  importation  slightly, 
26. 

EARTH,  a  machine  to  be  fashioned  to  man's 
purposes,  123. 

the  only  producer,  124. 

Earthenware  manufacture,  26. 

East  Indies,  British  supply  of  cotton  from,  176. 

Effects  of  putting  a  factory  or  furnace  in  ope- 
ration, 43. 

of  establishing  manufactures  in  the 

South,  50. 

Egypt,  British  supply  of  cotton  from,  1 70. 

Emigration  from  cotton  states,  121. 

from  Eastern  states,  87. 

should  be  stopped,  121. 

:.  westward,  20,  87. 

England  in  distress  by  reason  of  the  dispro- 
portion of-consumers  to  producers,  65. 

condition  of  inhabitants  of,  109,  154. 

fixes  the  price  of  products  of  the  far- 
mer, 141. 

real  wealth  of,  63. 

result  of  dependence  on,  60. 

English  colonies  continually  want  annexation, 
113. 

consumers  and  producers,  95. 

consumption  of  cotton,  107. 

consumption  of  cotton  cloth,  117. 


English  free  trade  disastrous  to  other  nations, 

132. 
market  for  our  cotton  does  not  grow 

with  its  production,  180. 

school,  its  doctrines,  29. 

teaching  of  its  opponents,  30. 

Exchanges,  how  affected  by  protection,  198. 
Exchangers,  influence  on  pauperism,  81. 

producers  make  sacrifices  to  the,  101. 

Expenditure,  public,  30,  38. 
Exportation  of  food,  81,*92. 
Exports,  value  of,  36. 

FARMER  can  get  most  clothing  for  his  produce 
when  the  power  of  producing  cloth  is 
greatest,  21. 

exhausted  by  free  trade,  73. 

how  he  may  get  the  highest  prices  in 

foreign  markets,  98. 

profit  by  emigration  only  under  pro- 
tection, 98. 

sells  in  the  cheapest  market,  and  buys 

in  the  dearest,  81. 

suffers  by  non-production  of  iron,  80. 

Flax,  manufacture  of,  26,  37. 

Flour  consumed  in  English  cotton  factories,!!!. 

Food,  product,  export,  and  import  of,  21. 

power  to  obtain  in  exchange  for  la- 
bour, 40. 

why  supply  of,  increases  faster  than 

the  demand,  97. 

why  scarce  in  England,  57. 

Freedom  of  man  increases  with  wealth  and 
population,  162. 

Free  trade  among  states,  3. 

approach  to,  creates  debt,  23. 

approach  to,  is  progress  downward,  160. 

based  on  cheap  labour,  130. 

doctrines  about  rights  of  man,  128. 

impoverishes  the  masses,  74. 

real,  beneficial  to  all,  135. 

.........  results,  if  introduced  in   the    United 

States,  132. 

Freights  should  be  included  in  valuation  of 
exports,  8. 

French  consumption  of  cotton,  122. 

productions,  139. 

productions  imported  into  the  United 

States,  27,  37. 

Friendship  unknown  in  trade,  205. 

Fuel  necessary  to  obtain  iron,  78. 

GIBRALTAR,  its  use,  112. 

God  and  silver  contribute  little  to  man's  ne- 
cessities, 190. 

Government,  bow  affected  by  protection,  221. 

Grain  dearer  in  coal  regions  than  in  Philadel- 
phia, 98. 

price  of,  would  increase  under  protec- 
tion, 98. 

production  of,  21,  35. 


HARMONY  of  interests,  41. 

perfect  throughout  the  whole  union,  1 17. 

between  planter,   manufacturer,   and 

ship-owner,  119. 
between  land-owners  and  labourers  of 

the  world,  131. 
Home  markets  make  highest  prices,  16. 

IMHIGRATION  affected  slowly  by  change  in  Ta- 
riff, 19. 


INDEX. 


vii 


Immigration  decreases  under  free  trade,  28. 

diagram  of,  34. 

diminishing  at  present,  20. 

effect  on  consumption,  130. 

effect  on  price  of  wheat,  96. 

should  be  encouraged,  121. 

stops  with  decreased   combination   of 

action,  94. 
results  of,  had  it  continued  at  the  same 

rate  as  in  1834, 115. 

table  of,  17. 

would  raise  price  of  man  abroad,  116. 

Importation  diminishes  under  free  trade,  28. 

means  of,  90. 

of  men  and  merchandise,  90. 

of  men  reduces  shipping  prices,  93. 

of  labour  and  iron,  81. 

under  different  tariffs,  9. 

Independence  of  England,  advantages  of,  97. 

India,  commerce  of,  103. 

attempts  to  raise  cotton  in,  103, 117, 

133. 

commerce  of,  103. 

cotton  exported  from,  to  England,  104. 

ruined  by  dependence  on  England,  61, 

103. 
Individual  credit,  how  affected  by  protection, 

213. 
Intellectual  condition  of  man,  how  affected  by 

protection,  209. 
Internal  commerce,  23. 
Ireland,  exports  of,  91. 

importation  of  cotton  into,  109. 

ruined  by  dependence  on  England,  61, 

103. 
Iron,  abounding  in  America,  78. 

associated  with  production,  125. 

chief  constituent  of  machinery,  78. 

consumption  of,  12,  32,  79. 

cost  of,  in  labour,  12. 

domestic  production  of,  11. 

fluctuation  in  price  of,  82. 

foundation  of  civilization,  78. 

non-production  of,  injures  the  producer 

of  food,  80. 
power   of    importing,  greatest    under 

protection,  13. 

production  of,  quadrupled  by  protec- 
tion, 83. 
quantity  of,  imported  since  1821,  10, 

11. 

LABOUR  and  capital  wasted  in  transportation, 

149. 

best  rewarded  under  protection,  28. 

gives  value  to  land,  124. 

has  smallest  return  where  machinery 

of  transportation  is  most  needed,  153. 
power  of,  to  obtain  food,  clothing,  and 

the  aid  of  machinery,  40. 

saved  in  New  England,  48. 

tends  to  produce  equality  of  condition, 

155. 

wasted  in  the  Southern  states,  49. 

Labourer,  how  affected  by  protection,  151. 

Labourers'  common  interest,  130. 

Lake  tonnage,  24,  36. 

Land,  a  great  saving  fund,  acquiring  value 

from  labour,  122. 

effect  of  sales  of,  on  immigration,  20. 

more  valuable   in   the    United  States 

than  in  Canada,  1 29. 


Land,  public,  220. 

quantity  of,  sold,  20. 

value  of,  depends  on  cost  of  transporta- 
tion, 127. 
Land-owners  in  England,  129. 

in  India,  Ireland,  Ac.,  129. 

in  Parliament,  132. 

remedy  for  their  grievances,  130. 

Lead,  consumption  of,  31. 

production  of,  18. 

Linens,  importation  of,  27. 

Louisville  and  Portland  canal,  trade  on,  35. 

MACHINERY,  increased  facility  of  procuring, 

causes  increased  production  of  food, 

21. 

must  be  brought  to  the  cotton,  144. 

object  of,  78. 

of  three  kinds,  151. 

power  to  obtain  in  aid  of  labour,  40. 

required  to  render  labour  productive. 

151. 

Man  the  most  valuable  commodity,  94. 
Manufacture  of  small  articles  in  the  West,  51. 
Manufacturer's  true  interest,  136. 
Markets,  the  best  for  products  are  those  made 

at  home,  45,  139. 

wanted  for  producers,  122. 

Marriage  regarded  as  a  luxury  in  Europe,  128. 
Merchants  are  agents  of  the  producers,  80. 
get  the  benefit  of  the  producer's  toil, 

81. 

Mission,  true,  of  the  United  States,  227. 
Monopoly  of  machinery  cause  of  the  planter's 

poverty,  76. 
of  machinery,  effects  of  abolishing  the, 

136. 
Morality,  how  affected  by  protection,  202. 

NATION,  how  affected  by  protection,  223. 
National  credit,  how  affected  by  protection, 

218. 
Necessity  for  producers  and  consumers  to  live 

near  each  other,  96. 
New  England,  wages  in,  will  rise  when  they 

increase  in  the  South  and  West,  153. 
New  Orleans,  trade  of,  25. 

diagram  of  produce  received  at,  36. 

New  York  canal  tolls,  24,  35. 

diagram  of  houses  built  in,  36. 

growth  of,  25. 

Non-production  of  iron  injures  the  producer  of 

food,  80. 

ORE  And  fuel  in  Ohio  and  the  West,  78. 
Over-population,  general  pretext  for  the  evils 
of  a  vicious  system,  65. 

wrongly  complained  of  in  Europe,  129. 

Over-production  and  under-consumption,  103. 

PAUPERISM  increases  in  free-trade  countries, 
128. 

results  from  the  English  colonial  sys- 
tem, 195. 

Pennsylvania  canal  tolls,  24,  35. 

Philadelphia,  growth  of,  25. 

Philadelphia,  ratio  of  growth  of,  to  the  popu- 
lation of  the  Union,  36. 

Planters'  advantages,  if  possessing  their  own 
machinery,  143. 

advantage  to,  arising  from  the  an- 
nexation of  Canada,  99. 


viii 


INDEX. 


Planters  benefited  by  consumption  of  cotton  at 
home,  116. 

impoverished  by  the  speculations  of 

exchangers,  76. 

need  machinery  to  convert  their  own 

crops,  138. 

oppose  their  own  interests,  169. 

tobacco  and  cotton,  relative  returns  for 

their  products,  119. 

true  policy  to  break  down  English  mo- 
nopoly of  machinery,  and  bring  Eng- 
lish machinery  to  the  cotton  field, 
185. 

why  they  receive  small  returns  for  their 

capital,  143. 

Population,  diagram  of,  33. 

of  Philadelphia,  36. 

Portugal,  causes  of  its  poverty,  112. 

Powers  of  man  increase  as  his  necessities 
diminish,  192. 

Prices  highest  when  a  nation  bays  and  sells 
at  home,  14. 

Producer's  returns  in  cotton  cloth,  112. 

Production  of  food  and  iron  unequal,  70. 

relation  of,  to  commerce,  68. 

Productive  power,  diminution  of,  brings  dis- 
cord and  internal  disorder,- 194. 

Proportion  of  producers  to  consumers  in  Eng- 
land, 55. 

Protection,  how  it  affects  morals,  202. 

public  credit,  217. 

revenue  and  expenditure,  42, 219. 

the  capitalist,  141. 

consumption  of  cotton,  108. 

currency,  185. 

exchanges,  198. 

friends  of  peace,  193. 

government,  221. 

growth  of  new  states,  88. 

intellectual  condition,  209. 

nation,  223. 

political  condition,  213. 

power  to  import,  42. 

price  of  cotton,  114. 

slave  and  his  master,  161. 

value  of  labour,  66. 

woman,  200. 

increases  immigration  and  the  number 

of  consumers,  08. 

raises  the  value  of  man,  130. 

raises  the  value  of  land,  133. 

reduces  prices,  and  increases  the  power 

of  consumption,  41. 

saves  cost  of  transportation,  141. 

why  required,  51. 

Public  credit,  31,  38. 

debt,  31,  38. 

expenditure,  30,  38. 

RAILROADS  do  not  lessen  the  number  of  horses, 

127. 

increase  production,  127. 

Return  freights,  93. 
Returns  for  products,  43.     - 
Revenue  from  customs,  diagram,  38. 

from  imports,  28. 

decreases  under  free  trade,  28. 

how  affected  by  different  tariffs,  29. 

how  affected  by  protection,  219. 

Road  from  the  Mississippi  to  the  Pacific,  90. 
to  be  productive,  must  go  through  rich 

countries,  89. 


Rothschild,  his  system  of  accumulating  wealth, 

75. 

Russia  wastes  food  for  want  of  a  market,  131. 
Russian  exports,  91. 
system  of  commerce,  91. 


SAVING-FDNDS  found  in  mills  furnaces,  and 
coal  mines,  46. 

Settlers'  life  and  experience,  126. 

Silver  and  gold  contribute  little  to  man's  ne- 
cessities, 191. 

Ship-owner's  true  interest,  136. 

Shipping  affected  slowly  by  changes  in  tariff, 
19. 

built  to  replace  vessels  sent  to  Califor- 
nia, 19. 

built,  tables'of,  19,  34. 

increases  with  protection,  90. 

Slavery  agitation,  how  best  ended,  165. 

would  be  abolished  by  making  a  mar- 
ket on  the  land  in  the  South,  164. 

Slave-history  of  England  disgraceful  to  that 
nation,  169. 

Slaves  have  been  well  kept  in  the  United 
States,  169. 

Northern  men  cannot  afford  to  raise. 

163. 

Smuggling  as  regarded  by  British  authorities, 
112. 

Soils,  poorest,  first  cultivated,  29. 

South  Carolina,  her  inability  to  produce  cotton 
in  competition  with  her  neighbours, 
166. 

Specie  and  bullion  should  be  included  in  Ta- 
riff tables,  7. 

imported  and  exported,  1829  to  1849, 


Steamboat  tonnage,  24,  34. 

Sugar,  production,  importatiom,  and  consump- 
tion of,  23,  35,  120. 

returns  for,  120. 

Swords  and  muskets  hinder  returns  to  labour, 
193. 

TARIFFS,  outline  history  of,  3. 

merits  of,  require   time   for  develop 

ment,  6. 

principal  features  of  that  of  1816,  5. 

1824,5. 

1828,  5. 

1832,  5. 

1833,5. 

1842,  5. 

1846,  5. 

of  1846,  effects  of  maintaining  it,  67. 

.........  1828,  effects  that  would  have  resulted 

from  Us  continuance,  115. 
Taxation  of  the  sugar  planter,  76. 

increased  by  pauperism,  76. 

Tea,  abolition  of  duty  on,  30. 

consumption  of,  28,  37. 

Tendency  to  produce  only  the  finest  cotton 

fabrics  in  England,  179. 
Tolls  on  internal  commerce,  24,  35. 
Tonnage,  increase  and  diminution  of,  19. 

lake,  24,  36. 

steamboat  24,  36. 

Tobacco,  consumption  of,  119. 
Tobacco  trade,  118. 
Trade  of  New  Orleans,  24. 

New  York,  25. 

Philadelphia,  25. 


INDEX. 


IX 


Trading  with  a  poor  people  tends  to  reduce 
our  wages  to  a  level  with  theirs,  77. 

Transportation,  costs  of,  reduce  the  value  of 
land,  127. 

capital  employed  in,  143. 

UNITED  STATES,  British  supply  of  cotton  from 
the,  171. 

exports  of  cotton  from,  to  England, 

106. 

exports  of  grain  from,  to  England, 

95. 

importation  of  men  into  the,  92. 

present  policy  of  the,  134. 

receipts  of  cloth  and  iron  from  Eng- 
land, 113. 

true  mission  of  the,  227. 

wealth  of,  in  land,  coal,  and  metals, 

128. 

Union  between  producers  and  consumers  most 
profitable  when  made  at  home,  51. 

VALUE  of  exports,  25. 
of  imports,  10. 


Variations  in  prices  caused  by  dependence  on 
England,  83. 

WAGES,  fall  under  free  trade,  28. 

of  labourers  in  England,  93. 

of  labourers  in  Ireland,  94, 

process  of  reducing,  75. 

War,  causes  of  recent,  193. 

on  the  labour  and  capital  of  the  world 

prepared  in  England,  95. 
on  what  the  power  to  make  it  depends, 

194. 
Wars  of  England,  Americans  responsible  for 

the,  197. 

Western  steamboat  tonnage,  36. 
Woman,  how  protection  affects,  200. 
Wool  trade,  102. 
Woollens,  consumption  of,  33. 
importations  of,  16,  37. 


ZOLLVEREIX,  cotton  trade  flourishing  under  its 

auspices,  107. 
imports  into  Prussia  before  and  after 

iti  formation,  107. 


THE 


HARMONY  OF  INTERESTS: 

AGRICULTURAL,  MANUFACTURING,  AND  COMMERCIAL. 


WHY  is  protection  needed?  Why  cannot  trade  with  foreign  nations  be 
carried  on  without  the  intervention  of  custom-house  officers  ?  Why  is  it  that 
that  intervention  should  be  needed  to  enable  the  loom  and  the  anvil  to  take 
their  natural  places  by  the  side  of  the  plough  and  the  harrow  ?  Such  are 
the  questions  which  have  long  occupied  my  mind,  and  to  the  consideration 
of  which  I  now  invite  my  readers. 

Of  the  advantage  of  perfect  freedom  of  trade,  theoretically  considered, 
there  could  be  no  doubt.  The  benefit  derived  from  such  freedom  in  the 
intercourse  of  the  several  States,  was  obvious  to  all ;  and  it  would  certainly 
seem  that  the  same  system  so  extended  as  to  include  the  commerce  with  the 
various  states  and  kingdoms  of  the  world  could  not  fail  to  be  attended  with 
similar  results.  Nevertheless,  every  attempt  at  so  doing  had  failed.  The 
low  duties  on  most  articles  of  merchandise  in  the  period  between  1816  and 
1827,  had  produced  a  state  of  things  which  induced  the  establishment  of 
the  first  really  protective  tariff,  that  of  1828.  The  approach  to  almost  per- 
fect freedom  of  trade  in  1840,  produced  a  political  revolution,  and  a  similar 
but  more  moderate  measure,  led  to  the  revolution  of  last  year.  These  were 
curious  facts,  and  such  as  were  deserving  of  careful  examination. 

It  may  be  assumed  as  an  universal  truth,  that  every  step  made  in  the  right 
direction  will  be  attended  with  results  so  beneficial  as  to  pave  the  way  for 
further  steps  in  the  same  direction,  and  that  every  one  made  in  the  wrong 
direction  will  be  attended  with  disadvantageous  results  tending  to  produce  a 
necessity  for  a  retrograde  movement.  The  compromise  bill,  in  its  final  stages, 
was  a  near  approach  to  perfect  freedom  of  trade,  the  highest  duty  being  only  20 
per  cent.  Believing  it  to  be  a  step  in  the  right  direction,  one  of  the  enthusiastic 
advocates  of  perfect  freedom  of  trade  proposed,  soon  after  its  passage,  that, 
commencing  with  1842,  there  should  be  a  further  reduction  of  one  percent, 
per  annum  for  twenty  years,  at  the  end  of  which  time  all  necessity  for  custom- 
houses would  have  disappeared.  W.ith  the  gradual  operation  of  the  earlie 
etages  of  that  bill  there  was,  however,  produced  a  state  of  depression  so 
extraordinary  as  to  lead  to  a  political  change  before  reaching  its  final  stages , 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 


and  the  duties  had  scarcely  touched  the  point  of  20  per  cent,  before  they 
were  raised  to  30,  50,  60,  or  more,  by  the  passage  of  the  tariff  of  1842. 
With  the  election  of  1844,  the  friends  of  free  trade  were  restored  to  power, 
and  two  years  afterwards  was  passed  the  tariff  of  1846 — the  free-trade 
measure — in  which  the  revenue  duty  on  articles  to  be  protected  was  fixed 
at  tfiirty  per  cent.  Here  was  a  retrograde  movement.  Instead  of  passing 
from  twenty  downwards,  we  went  up  to  thirty,  and  thus  was  furnisned  an 
admission  that  so  near  an  approach  to  free  trade  with  foreign  nations  as  was 
to  be  found  in  twenty  per  cent,  duties  had  not  answered  in  practice.  Since 
then,  it  has  been  admitted,  even  by  the  most  decided  free-trade  advocates, 
that  on  certain  commodities  even  thirty  per  cent,  was  too  low,  and  within 
six  months  from  the  date  of  the  passage  of  the  act  of  1846,  its  author  pro- 
posed to  increase  a  variety  of  articles  to  thirty-five  and  forty  per  cent.* 
Here  was  another  retrograde  movement.  It  is  now  admitted  that  there  are 
other  articles  the^  duties  on  which  require  to  be  raised,  and  daily  experience 
goes  to  prove  that  such  must  be  the  case,  or  we  must  abandon  some  of  the 
most  important  branches  of  industry.  The  tendency  is,  therefore,  altogether 
backward.  Thirty  per  cent,  duty  is  now  regarded  as  almost  perfect  freedom 
of  trade,  and  instead  of  proposing  a  further  annual  reduction,  each  year  pro- 
duces a  stronger  disposition  for  a  considerable  increase.  In  all  this,  it  is 
impossible  to  avoid  seeing  that  there  is  great  error  somewhere,  and  almost 
equally  impossible  to  avoid  feeling  a  desire  to  understand  why  it  is  that  the 
approaches  towards  freedom  of  trade  with  foreign  nations  have  so  frequently 
failed,  and  why  it  is  that  every  strictly  revenue  tariff  is  higher  than  that 
which  preceded  it. 

With  a  view  to  satisfy  myself  in  regard  thereto,  I  have  recently  made  the 
examination,  before  referred  to,  of  our  commercial  policy  during  the  last 
twenty-eight  years,  commencing  with  1821,  being  the  earliest  in  relation  to 
which  detailed  statements  have  been  published.  Before  commencing  to  lay 
before  you  the  results  obtained,  it  may  be  well  to  say  a  few  words  as  to  the 
merits  claimed  by  the  two  parties  for  their  respective  systems. 

The  one  party  insists  that  protection  is  "  a  war  upon  labour  and  capital," 
and  that  by  compelling  the  application  of  both  to  pursuits  that  would  other- 
wise be  unproductive,  the  amount  of  necessaries,  comforts,  and  conveniences 
of  life  obtainable  by  the  labourer  is  diminished.  The  other  insists  that  by 
protecting  the  labourer  from  competition  with  the  ill-fed  and  worse-clothed 
workmen  of  Europe,  the  reward  of  labour  will  be  increased.  Each  has  thus 
his  theory,  and  each  is  accustomed  to  furnish  facts  to  prove  its  truth,  and 
both  can  do  so  while  limiting  themselves  to  short  periods  of  time,  taking  at 
some  times  years  of  small  crops,  and  at  others  those  of  large  ones,  and  thus 
it  is  that  the  inquirer  after  truth  is  embarrassed.t  No  one  has  yet,  to  my 
knowledge,  ever  undertaken  to  examine  all  the  facts  during  any  Jong  period 
of  time,  with  a  view  to  show  what  have  been,  under  the  various  systems, 
the  powers  of  the  labourer  to  command  the  necessaries  and  comforts  of  life. 
One  or  other  of  the  systems  is  true,  and  that  is  true  under  which  labour  is 
most  largely  rewarded  :  that  under  which  the  labourer  is  enabled  to  consume 
most  largely  of  food,  fuel,  clothing,  and  all  other  of  those  good  things  for  the 
attainment  of  which  men  are  willing  to  labour.  If,  then,  we  can  ascertain 
the  power  of  consumption  at  various  periods,  and  the  result  be  to  show  that 
it  has  invariably  increased  under  one  course  of  action,  and  as  invariably 
diminished  under  another,  it  will  be  equivalent  to  a  demonstration  of  the 

*  Treasury  Report,  Feb.  1,  1847. 

f  A  person  employed  in  the  preparation  of  government  statistics  inquired,  on  being 
asked  to  prepare  some  tables,  what  was  to  be  the  policy  to  be  proved.  «  Why,"  said  the 
ether,  "could  you  prove  both  sides?"  "Equally  well,"  said  he. 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 


truth  of  the  one  and  the  falsehood  of  the  other.  To  accomplish  this,  has 
been  the  object  of  the  inquiry  in  which  I  have  recently  been  engaged. 

It  is  necessary  now  to  show  what  have  been  the  distinguishing  features 
of  the  several  systems  that  have  been  in  operation  during  the  period  to  be 
examined.  They  are  as  follows  : — 

First.  The  tariff  of  1816  was  a  planters'  and  farmers'  measure.  Cotton 
and  coarse  cotton  cloths  were  carefully  protected.  Iron  itself  was  well  pro- 
tected, but  almost  all  manufactures  of  iron,  the  commodities  for  the  pro- 
duction of  which  pig  or  bar  iron  could  be  used,  were  admitted  at  20  per 
cent.  Wool  paid  15  per  cent.  Blankets  and  woollen  and  stuff  goods  paid  15 
per  cent.,  and  finer  goods  25  per. cent.,  until  1819,  after  which  they  paid 
but  20  per  cent.  Spirits  paid  a  heavy  specific  duty,  for  the  benefit  of  the 
farmers  ;  but  paper,  hats,  caps,  manufactures  of  leather,  types,  and  manu- 
factured articles  generally,  paid  only  from  20  to  30  per  cent.  Coal  paid  5  cents 
per  bushel,  but  the  commodities  in  the  manufacture  of  which  coal  was  to  be 
used  paid  ad  valorem  duties.  Protection  was  thus  given  to  the  coarse 
commodities  that  least  required  it,  and  refused  to  those  for  the  production 
of  which  the  coarser  ones  were  to  be  used.  As  a  matter  of  course,  its  pro- 
tective features  were  totally  inoperative. 

Second.  That  of  1824,  under  which  iron  was,  as  before,  well  protected, 
but  manufactures  of  iron,  and  of  metals  generally,  were  admitted  at  25  per 
cent.  Wool  was  raised  to  20  per  cent.,  to  increase,  by  successive  stages, 
until  it  reached  30  per  cent.  Coarse  woollens  were  fixed  permanently  at 
25  per  cent.  Finer  ones  were  to  rise  gradually  until  they  reached  33£  per 
cent.  Carpets  paid  from  20  to  50  cents  per  square  yard.  Hams  paid  3, 
and  butter  5  cents  per  pound.  Potatoes  10,  oats  10,  and  wheat  25  cents 
per  bushel ;  while  scythes,  spades,  shovels,  and  other  things  requisite  for 
the  raising  of  wheat  and  potatoes,  paid  30  per  cent.  Spirits  were  carefully 
protected.  Bolting  cloths  paid  15  per  cent.  Sail-duck,  Osnaburgs,  &c.,  15  per 
cent.  Cotton  cloths  paid  25  per  cent.,  with  a  minimum  of  30  cents  per 
yard.  The  general  features  of  this  law  did  not  vary  materially  from  those 
of  that  of  1816,  although  protection  was  slightly  increased. 

Third.  The  first  tariff  thoroughly  protective,  and  so  intended  to  be,  was 
that  of  1828.  It  continued  until  1832,  when  was  passed  the  first  of  two 
laws  by  which  the  whole  policy  of  the  country  was  changed.  This  series 
constitutes  stage  the 

Fourth.  By  the  act  of  July  14,  1832,  railroad  iron  was  admitted  free  of 
duty.  Axes,  spades,  &c.,  as  before,  30  per  cent.  Bar  and  pig  iron  were 
carefully  protected,  but  a  large  portion  of  the  commodities  for  which  they 
were  needed  were  thus  admitted  without  duty,  or  at  the  same  rate  as  under 
our  present  free-trade  tariff.  Tea  and  coffee  were  free.  Silks  paid  10  per 
cent.  Wool  was  protected,  but  worsted  stuff  goods  were  admittpd  at  10  per 
cent.  Cotton  goods  paid  25  per  cent.,  with  minimums  of  30)Cents  for  plain, 
and  35  for  prints.  This  continued  in  force  until  the  following  March,  when 
was  passed  the  Compromise  Jlct,  under  which  linens,  stuff  goods,  silks,  and 
other  articles  were  admitted  free  of  duty,  and  one-tenth  of  the  excess  over 
20  per  cent,  reduced  from  all  other  commodities,  to  take  effect  December, 
1833,  with  a  further  similar  reduction  every  two  years  until  1841,  when 
one-half  of  the  remaining  surplus  was  to  be  reduced,  and  the  other  half  in 
1842,  when  no  duty  would  exceed  20  per  cent. 

Fifth.  The  protective  tariff  of  1842,  which  was  followed  by 

Sixth.  The  free  trade  tariff  of  1846,  now  in  existence. 

We  have  thus  had  six  different  systems,  but  the  first  and  second  differ 
rrom  each  other  so  little  that  it  is  unnecessary  to  separate  the  years  falling 
under  them,  whereas  the  early  years  of  the  Compromise  differ  so  essentially 


C  THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 

from  the  two  latter  that  it  is  expedient  to  separate  them.  I  shall  therefore 
group  the  results  as  follows  : — 

First.  The  tariffs  of  1816  and  1824,  ending  with  1829. 

Second.  That  of  1828,  commencing  with  October,  1829,  and  ending 
with  the  period  at  which  the  Compromise  began  to  become  operative,  Oc- 
tober, 1834. 

Third.  The  Compromise,  commencing  with  1835  and  ending  with  1841. 

Fourth.  The  years  1842  and  1843,  the  period  immediately  preceding 
and  following  the  passage  of  the  act  of  1842,  being  that  of  the  strictly  reve- 
nue tariff  of  20  per  cent. 

Fifth.  The  tariff  of  1842,  commencing  June,  1843,  and  ending  June. 
1847. 

Sixth.  That  of  1846,  commencing  June,  1847,  and  coming  down  to  the 
present  time. 

It  will  be  observed  that  I  have  placed  the  year  1829  in  the  first  period. 
and  1834  in  the  second.  It  is  not  the  passage  of  an  act  that  produces 
change,  but  its  practical  operation,  and  the  first  year  of  the  existence  of  a 
new  system  is  but  the  sequel  of  that  which  is  passing  out.  When  pro- 
tection is  given  to  the  makers  of  cloth  and  iron,  mills  and  furnaces  are  not 
built  in  a  day,  nor  are  they  abandoned  as  soon  as  protection  is  withdrawn. 
Had  it  been  possible,  I  would  have  pursued  the  same  precise  system  with 
every  period,  but  it  was  not.  The  act  of  1842  came  into  operation  on  the 
first  of  September  of  that  year,  and  in  the  following  one  the  time  for  making 
up  the  Treasury  accounts  was  changed  to  June  30,  and  therefore  only  the 
first  ten  months  that  followed  its  going  into  effect  could  be  included  under 
the  previous  period.  That  of  1846  did  not  come  into  effect  until  December  1, 
and  therefore  but  the  first  seven  months  that  followed  could  be  included  in 
the  system  of  1842.  The  law  of  1842  was  in  existence  four  years  and  a 
quarter,  but  I  could  give  it  only  four  years,  which  works  materially  to  its 
disadvantage,  and  to  the  advantage  of  that  of  1846. 

In  some  cases  even  more  than  a  year  would  be  required  to  make  an  exact 
comparison  of  the  working  of  the  different  systems.  The  immigration  of 
one  year  is  materially  influenced,  perhaps  I  might  say  determined,  by  the 
state  of  the  labour-market  of  the  previous  year,  and  the  change  in  that  is  at 
least  a  year  subsequent  to  the  passage  of  a  law.  Thus,  if  the  tariff  of  1842 
tended  to  raise  the  compensation  of  the  labourer,  its  effects  would  not  be- 
come obvious  until  1843,  and  it  would  not  be  until  1844  or  even  1845,  that 
an  increase  of  immigration  would  take  place.  The  price  of  labour  was 
high  in  1847-8,  and  we  have  a  large  amount  of  immigration  in  1849.  It 
is  now  falling,  and  the  immigration  of  next  year  will  probably  be  reduced. 

So  likewise  is  it  with  the  supply  of  grain.  A  diminution  in  the  demand 
for  labour  in  mines  and  furnaces  in  1842  tended  to  increase  emigration  to 
the  West.  For  the  first  year,  1843,  those  emigrants  were  consumers  only. 
In  the  second,  1844,  they  had  grain  to  sell,  and  prices  fell.  In  the  present 
year,  the  demand  for  labour  in  mines  and  furnaces,  and  in  the  erection  of 
mills  and  furnaces,  is  diminished,  and  emigration  to  the  West  is  increased, 
yet  the  effect  of  this  on  the  supply  and  price  of  food  may  not,  and  probably 
will  not  become  obvious  until  1852. 

Your  predecessor  appears  entirely  to  have  overlooked  this  necessity  for 
allowing  time  to  permit  new  systems  to  develope  themselves,  and  to  affect 
the  movements  of  the  people.  In  his  last  report  to  Congress  is  given  a 
comparative  view  of  the  receipts  from  customs  in  the  last  six  months  of  the 
tariff  of  1842,  and  the  first  six  of  that  of  1846,  by  which  it  is  shown  that  the 
one  was  twice  as  productive  as  the  other,  and  yet  very  slight  reflection 
would  have  sufficed  to  satisfy  him  that  scarcely  any  portion  of  t^e  difference 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 


bad  resulted  from  the  change  of  commercial  policy  indicated  by  the  adoption 
of  his  tariff.  The  amount  that  could  be  imported  and  paid  for  was  dependent 
on  the  state  of  affairs  that  had  existed  in  the  country  during  the  previous  year, 
and  the  passage  of  the  law  had  scarcely  even  the  slightest  influence  upon 
it.  In  the  same  way,  the  receipts  from  customs  from  September,  1842,  to 
November,  1846,  are  compared  with  those  of  1847  and  1848,  when  it  is 
well  known  that  in  1842,  under  the  Compromise,  the  imports  had  fallen  so 
low  that  the  government  was  compelled  to  send  to  Europe  to  endeavour  to 
effect  a  loan  for  ,ts  support  even  in  a  time  of  profound  peace.  If  a  cause 
has  right  on  its  side,  such  erroneous  views  cannot  be  required  to  be  pre- 
sented. In  the  tables  that  I  shall  now  offer  for  consideration,  I  have  pur- 
sued, as  nearly  as  possible,  a  uniform  course,  commencing  each  period  at 
the  time  at  which  the  system  might  fairly  be  deemed  to  become  operative, 
to  wit :  at  the  close  of  the  fiscal  year  following  the  one  in  which  the  law  was 
enacted.  If  error,  then,  exist  at  the  commencement  of  the  period,  it  will 
find  its  compensation  at  the  close,  and  thus  justice  will  be  done  to  all. 

There  still  remain  two  other  points  in  regard  to  these  tables,  to  which  I 
have  to  ask  your  attention. 

First.  It  is  usual  in  almost  all  tables  of  import  and  export  to  exclude 
specie  and  bullion.  This  is  wrong,  and  tends  to  produce  error,  and  to  pre- 
vent a  proper  understanding  of  the  working  of  the  system  that  may  be  under 
consideration.  Gold  and  silver  are  commodities  produced  abroad,  of  which 
we  consume  large  quantities,  occasionally  exporting  the  surplus ;  and  there 
18  no  reason  whatever  why  they  should  not  be  treated  precisely  as  are 
coffee,  wines,  brandy,  and  other  foreign  commodities.  When  they  are  im- 
ported they  come  in  exchange  for  our  products,  and  the  sum  of  merchandise 
and  specie  imported  is  the  value  of  our  exports.  When  exported,  they  go 
m  lieu  of  our  products,  and  should  be  treated  as  foreign  merchandise  re- 
exported.  By  deducting  them  from  the  value  of  the  merchandise  imported 
we  obtain  the  value  of  our  domestic  exports. 

Second.  It  is  usual  to  affix  to  the  commodities  exported  arbitrary  prices, 
and.  thus  to  obtain  their  money  value.  These  prices  are  fixed  at  the  ports 
af  shipment,  and  represent  only  what  we  ask  for  the  commodities  we  have 
;o  sell,  not  what  we  get  for  them.  They  represent,  too,  the  prices  minus 
\he  earnings  of  the  machinery  employed  in  performing  the  work  of  trans- 
portation, which  must  then  be  guessed  at.  The  consequence  of  all  this  is, 
that  the  tables  published  by  the  Treasury  are  totally  worthless  as  guides  to 
a  proper  understanding  of  the  general  course  of  trade.  What  is  needed  to 
obtain  such  an  understanding  is  that  the  nation  make  out  its  accounts  as  it 
would  do  if  it  were  a  merchant,  putting  down  not  the  price  asked  but  the 
price  received,  and  then  balancing  its  books  by  ascertaining  whether  the 
year's  business  has  increased  or  diminished  its  debts.  The  amount  received 
for  our  exports  constitutes  their  precise  value,  and  to  ascertain  what  is  that 
amount  we  should  take  the  value  of  merchandise  imported,  deducting  there- 
from any  debt  contracted,  or  adding  thereto  any  debt  paid  off,  during  the 
year.  Thus,  if  the  imports  be  $100,000,000,  and  the  debt  contracted  by 
the  transfer  of  stocks  has  been  $10,000,000,  the  amount  paid  for  by  our  ex- 
ports is  only  $90,000,000.  On  the  contrary,  if  we  have  paid  off  that  amount  of 
debt,  it  should  be  added,  and  we  should  thus  obtain  $110,000,000  as  the 
true  value  of  the  produce  and  merchandise  exported.  The  freights  are  thus 
included. 

To  carry  this  fully  into  practice  in  the  following  tables  would  be  im- 
practicable, but  it  may  be  done  in  part.  It  is  generally  understood  that  the 
amount  of  American  stocks,  public  and  private,  held  in  Europe  in  184i 
exceeded  $200,000,000,  and  there  is  reason  to  believe  that  they  exceeded 


8  THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 

by  $170,000,000  the  amount  held  in  November,  1834,  when  the  great  stock 
speculation  commenced.*  By  deducting  this  sum  from  the  merchandise 
imported  between  the  close  of  1834  and  the  year  1841,  we  shall  obtain  the 
value  of  produce  and  merchandise  exported.  A  part  of  this  debt  was  ab 
sorbed  in  the  years  1845,  1846,  and  1847,  while  on  the  other  hand  new 
debts  were  created  last  year,  and  are  now  being  created  by  the  transmission 
of  evidences  of  debt.  To  the  imports  of  the  three  first  named  should  be 
added  the  debt  absorbed,  and  from  those  of  the  last  two  years  should  be 
deducted  the  debt  created,  and  we  should  then  obtain  the  actual  amount 
paid  for  by  produce  and  domestic  merchandise  exported,  and  by  the  ship- 
ping employed  in  the  work  of  transportation. 

There  are  other  and  earlier  years  in  which  corrections  might  be  required, 
but  they  are  of  trifling  amount  by  comparison  with  those  to  which  I  have 
referred.  In  those  years  small  loans  were  made,  but  it  is  probable  that 
nearly  as  much  was  paid  off,  except  perhaps  in  1825,  in  which  a  con- 
siderable amount  of  European  debt  was  created.  The  amount,  however, 
is  so  uncertain  that  I  have  not  thought  it  worth  while  to  make  any  cor- 
rection therefor;  although  to  do  so  might,  and  perhaps  would,  produce  a 
sensible  diminution  in  the  value  received  for  our  produce  exported  prior  to 
1829,  which  would  thereby  be  placed  in  a  somewhat  worse  position  than 
that  in  which  I  have  represented  it. 

With  these  remarks,  I  will  now  proceed  to  lay  before  you  the  results  of 
my  inquiries.  In  doing  so,  I  will  give  every  fact  that  appears  to  me  likely 
to  throw  light  on  this  important  question,  concealing  nothing.  If,  then, 
those  who  have  arrived  at  conclusions  different  from  mine,  and  are  in  pos- 
session of  other  facts,  will  put  them  together  as  I  now  do,  we  may  by  de- 
grees arrive  at  the  truth.  It  is  the  great  question  for  the  nation,  and  it  is 
time  that  it  should  be  examined  as  a  purely  scientific,  and  not  as  a  party  or 
sectional  one. 


CHAPTER  SECOND. 

The  average  population  of  the  Union  in  the  several  periods  referred  to, 
is  thus  estimated  in  the  last  Treasury  Report  :t 

First.  For  the  years  from  that  ending  Dec.  31,  1821,  to  that  of 

Dec.  31,  1829 11,247,000 

Second.  From  Sept.  1829,  to  Sept.  1834J  ....  13,698,000 

Third.  From  Sept.  1834,  to  Sept.  1841     .         .         .         .  16,226,000 

Fourth.  From  Sept.  1841,  to  June,  1843  .         .         .         .  18,296,000 

Fifth.  From  June,  1843,  to  June,  1847J    ....  19,771,000 

Sixth.  From  June,  1847,  to  June,  1848     ....  21,000,000 

Seventh.  From  June,  1848,  to  June,  1849         .         ...  21,700,000 


•  Report  of  Select  Committee  on  Banks  of  Issue :  Evidence  of  Mr.  I.  Horsley  Palmei, 
page  106. 
•j-  Page  68. 

$  As  these  years  are  frequently  referred  to  separately,  I  give  their  population,  on  the 
•ame  authority: — 


1829-'30 
1830-'31 
1831 -'32 
1832-'33 
1833-'34 


12,856,165 
13,377,415 
13,698,665 
14,119,915 
14,541,165 


1843-'44  .  19,034,332 

1844-'45  .  19,525,749 

1845-'46  .  20,017,165 

1846-47  .  20,508,582 

1847-'48  21,000,000 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 


The  amount  of  foreign  merchandise,  specie  included,*   retained  in  these 
several  periods,  has  been  as  follows : — 

Total.  Annual  Average.    Pr.  head. 

1821  to  1829        ....  $508,000,000    56,400,000    $5-00 

1830 55,500,000  4-32 

1831 81,000,000  6-10 

1832     .....  75,500,000  5-51 

1833 88,000,000  6-20 

1834 103,000,000  7-08 

1835  to  1841        .        .    854,000,000 
Deduct  debt  incurred      170,000,000 


684,000,000    97,700,000      6-02 


1842  to  1843  (21  months,ending June  30,)  145,000,000    82,000,000 

1843-'44 96,000,000 

1844-'45 101,000,000 

1845-'46     .         .         .      110,000,000 
Add  debt  and  back  in- 
terest paid        .          5,000,000     115,000,000 


1846-'47 


Do. 


138,000,000 
5,000,000     143,000,000 


1847-'48    .        .        .      131,600,000 
Deduct  debt  incurred         8,000,000      121,600,000 


4-48 
5-03 
5-16 


6-75 

7 

5-88 


1848-'49 


.     134,700,000 
Do.  22,000,000     112,700,000  5-19 

The  facts  derivable  from  an  examination  of  the  above  accounts  are  as 
follows : — 

First.  That  the  amount  received  from  foreign  nations  in  exchange  for  our 
surplus  products  largely  increased  during  the  existence  of  the  tariff  of  1828. 

Second.  That  the  amount  so  received  diminished  greatly  after  the  Com- 
promise Bill  began  to  become  operative. 

Third.  That  the  amount  so  received  from  foreign  nations  was  still  fur- 
ther and  largely  diminished  under  the  strictly  revenue  clauses  of  that  bill, 
and  that  the  tendency  was  downward  when  the  system  was  changed. 

Fourth.  That  the  amount  so  received  increased  rapidly  under  the  tariff 
of  1842,  attaining  nearly  the  same  point  that  had  been  reached  under  the 
tariff  of  1828,  and  that  in  both  cases  the  tendency  was  still  upwards  when 
the  system  was  changed. 

Fifth.  That  the  amount  so  received  diminished  in  the  year  1848. 

Seventh.  That  the  amount  of  debt  incurred  in  the  last  two  years  must 
tend  to  produce  a  further  diminution  in  future  ones. 

In  establishing  the  scale  of  value  of  our  exports,  including  the  earnings 
of  shipping,  the  following  is  the  order  to  be  pursued  : — 

First,  and  lowest.  The  strictly  revenue  clauses  of  the  Compromise  Act. 

•  The  movement  of  specie  in  those  periods  was  as  follows  :— 


1821  to  1829,  Excess  export  .  $9,000,000 

1830  to  1834,  Excess  import  .  25.000,000 

1835  to  1841,       «           «  .  27,000,000 

1842  and  1843,   «           «  .  20,000,000 

1844  to  1847,       «           «  .  18,000,000 

1848,  Excess  export             .  .  9,000,000 

1849.  «     import            .  .  2,000,000 


Deducted  from  the  merchandise 

imported. 
Added  thereto. 

do. 

do. 

do. 

Deducted. 
Added. 


10  THE    HARMONY  OF    INTERESTS. 

Second.  The  partially  protective  tariffs  of  1816  and  1824. 

Third.  The  Compromise  Act. 

Fourth.  The  tariff  of  1828. 

Fifth,  and  highest.  The  tariff  of  1842. 

Thus  far,  the  tariff  of  1846  stands  below  that  of  1842,  and  the  tendency 
is  downward,  but  to  what  place  in  the  scale  it  will  descend  can  be  deter- 
mined only  after  it  shall  have  been  some  years  in  operation. 

CHAPTER    THIRD. 
REVIEW  OF  THE  COMMERCIAL  POLICY  OF  THE  LAST  THIRTY  YEARS. 

I  NOW  proceed  to  show  in  .detail  the  consumption  of  various  commo- 
dities, of  foreign  and  domestic  production.  In  doing  so,  it  will  be  necessary 
in  some  cases,  to  arrive  at  a  correct  understanding,  to  make  allowances 
similar  to  those  above  given :  my  object  being  that  of  showing  what  was 
the  power  to  consume  that  was  derived  from  the  power  to  produce  commodi- 
ties to  be  given  in  exchange  for  those  which  were  consumed.*  It  would  be 
proper  to  do  this  in  all,  but  the  effect  would  be  to  render  the  whole  somewhat 
complicated,  besides  involving  much  labour.  In  giving  the  imports  of  the 
period  from  1834  to  1841,  they  will  always  be  accompanied  with  the  mark 
of  minus  one-fifth,  so  as  to  show  the  amount  consumed  and  paid  for.  In 
giving  those  of  1845—6  and  1846—7,  they  will,  in  some  important  cases,  be 
accompanied  with  that  of  plus  one-twentieth,  so  as  to  show  the  quantity  of 
merchandise  imported  in  a  previous  period,  and  then  paid  for  by  the  cancel- 
ling of  certificates  of  debt.  Those  of  1848  will  have  the  mark  of  minus 
one-seventh,  to  show  the  amount  paid  for  by  the  re-export  of  nine  millions 
of  foreign  merchandise  in  the  form  of  specie,  and  the  export  of  eight  millions 
of  certificates  of  debt.  Of  the  imports  of  the  year  ending  in  June  last, 
amounting  to  $134,700,000,  about  $22,000,000,  or  one-sixth,  were  obtained 
in  exchange  for  such  certificates,  and  will  be  so  marked. 

The  total  value  of  pig,  bar  and  manufactured  IRON,  of  every  description, 
imported  into  the  Union,  since  1821,  has  been  as  follows : — 

Years  ending,  per  head, 

Sept.  30,  1821  to  1829,  average          ....  $5,400,000  48  cents. 

"        1830        .......  5,900,000  46    « 

"        1831 7,200,000  54    « 

tt         1832 8,800,000  64     « 

"        1833 7,700,000  55    « 

"1834 8,500,000  59     « 

«         1835  to  1841        .        $10,000,000—.$,       .  8,000,000  49    « 

«        1842  to  June  30,  1843,  average        .        .  5,500,000  30    « 

June  30, 1844 5,700,000  30     « 

"         I845 9,000,000  46     « 

1846  .        .         .          $5,830,000  +  ^       .  6,120,000  31     « 

1847  ...  +5^.  9,000,000         44     «• 
"        1848    .                 .          12,500,000  — j        .     10,800,000        50    * 
"        18*9        .        ,        -      13,833,094— J    .         11,500,000        53 

•  See  page  9. 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 


11 


We  see  here,  that  the  value  imported  and.  paid  for,  largely  increased  from 
from  1830  to  1834,  under  the  protective  tariff  of  1828 ;  that  it  diminished 
considerably  between  1834  and  1841,  and  that  it  reached  the  lowest  point  in 
1841-2  and  1842-3.  Thenceforward  it  rose,  and  the  year  1846-7  shows  an 
advance  of  about  fifty  per  cent,  from  the  lowest  point.  It  is  therefore  ob- 
vious, that  the  power  to  pay  for  foreign  iron  increased  under  protection,  and 
diminished  with  its  withdrawal.  I  give  now  the  quantity  of  various  kinds 
of  IRON  imported : 


1821  to  1829,  average, 

1830, 

1831, 

1832,      

1833,  ...... 

1834, 


Pig,  Old, 
tons.  tons. 
1500  — 


Rolled, 
tons. 
5400 


Hoop, 
tons. 
1500 


Steel, 
tons. 
1200 


Ham'd, 
tons. 
26,000 


Total,    Prh. 
tons.      Ibs. 
35,650     7 


......      1129  —  6449  1038  1223  30,693  40,532     7 

.....  6448  —  17,245  2532  1710  23,308  51,243  8} 

......  10,151  —  20,387*  2853  2146  38,150  73,687  12 

.  .  ;  .  .  9330  998  28,028*  3350  2131  36,129  79,961  13 

......  11,113  1617  28,896*  2214  2431  31,784  78,055  12 

1835  to  1841,  average  —  £     8800  640  36,000*  2600  2150  24,000  74,19010 


1842-3,  average, 


14.500   500  46,000f  2900  2400  14,750  81,050  10 


1844, 26,050  5770  46,000 

1845, 27,000  5800  51,000 

1846, 24,000  2350  24,000 

1847 27,800  1850  40,000 

1848,  .    .     —  1  44,000  5700  70,000 


1849, —  £88,000     8000145,000    10,000 


3600  2800  17,500  101,720  12 

5800  2800  18,176  110,576  13 

5040  5200  21,800     82.390     9 

6000  5400  15,300     96J350  lOf 

8300  5850  17,000  150,850  16 


9,000  260,000  27 


The  quantity  paid  for  by  our  exports  was  thus  almost  doubled  before  the 
termination  of  the  second  period,  in  1834;  while  it  diminished  under  the 
compromise,  and  still  further  under  the  revenue  system.  As  the  tariff  of 
1842  came  into  activity,  we  find  a  rapid  increase  in  the  power  to  purchase, 
until  the  import  became  checked  by  the  vast  increase  in  the  price  abroad,  and 
in  the  manufacture  at  home. 

DOMESTIC   PRODUCTION   OF  IRON. 

In  1810,  the  whole  number  of  furnaces  in  the  Union  was  153,  yielding  54,OOC  tons  of 

metal,  equal  to  16  pounds  per  head  of  the  population. 
1821,  the  manufacture  was  in  a  state  of  ruin. 

1828,  the  product  had   reached  130,000  tons,  having  little  more  than  doubled  in 
eighteen  years. 

1829,  it  was  142,000.     Increase  in  one  year,  nearly  ten  per  cent 

1830,  "      165,000.     Increase  in  two  years,  more  than  twenty-five  per  cent. 

1831,  «      191,000.     Increase  in  three  years,  about  fifty  per  cent. 

1833,       "      200,000,  giving  an  increase  in  three  years  of  above  sixty  percent. 
1840,  the  quantity  given  by  the  census  was  286,000,  but  a  committee  of  the  Home 

League,  in   New  York,  made  it  347,700  tons.      Taking  the  medium  of  the 

two,  it  would  give  about  315,000  tons,  being  an  increase  in  eight  years  of  fifty 

per  cent. 
1842,  a  large  portion  of  the  furnaces  were  closed,  and   the  product  had  fallen  to 

probably  little  more  than  200,000,  but  certainly  less  than  230,000  tons. 

1846,  it  was  estimated,  by  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury,  at  765,000  tons,  having 
trebled  in  four  years. 

1847,  it  was  supposed  to  have  reached  the  amount  of  not  less  than  800,000  tons. 

1848,  it  became  stationary. 

1849,  many  furnaces  being  already  closed,  the  production  of  the  present  year  cannot 
be  estimated  above  650,000  tons ;  but,  from  the  accumulation  of  stock  and  the 
difficulty  of  selling  it,  it  is  obvious  that  the  diminution  next  year  will  be 
greater. 


Railroad  iron  free  of  duty.          •}•  Duty  re-imposed. 


12  THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 

Domestic  product        Per  head.           Import.  Total  consumption 

Per  head. 

1821  to  1829,  average,   .     90,000                  18                  7  25 

1830 165,000                   29                   7  36 

1831, 191,000                   33                   8}  41} 

1832 210,000                   35                 12  47 

1833, 210,000*                 33                 13  46 

1834, 210,000*                33                12  45 

1835  to  1841,  average,    .250,000                   35                 11  46 

1842-1843,  average,          230,000                  28                10  38 

1844, 380,000                  45                12  57 

1845, 500,000                  58                13  71 

1846,   . 765,000                   86                   9  95 

1847, 800,000                   88                 10}  98} 

1848 800,000                  86                19  105 

Deduct  from  this  the  quantity  imported  in  exchange  for  certi- 
ficates of  debt,  and  therefore  remaining  to  be  paid  for  at  a 

future  time, 3 

There  will  remain 102 

If  now  we  further  deduct  from  this  the  accumulation  of  stock  on 
hand,  we  shall  find  the  consumption  not  exceeding  that  of  the 

preceding  year,  say 98} 

1849 650,000  67  32          99 

The  value  imported  in  this  period  is  $13,800,000,  and  the  amount 
of  debt  incurred  is  $22,000,000,  chiefly  for  this  iron.  The 
quantity  on  hand  is  variously  estimated  between  250  and  SCO 
thousand  tons.  Taking  the  former,  the  amount  per  head  would 
be 26 

Which  being  deducted,  would  leave  the  consumption  at      .    —      73 

From  1821  to  1829,  the  cost  of  iron,  in  labour,  was  high,  as  is  shown  in 
the  fact  that  the  consumption  was  but  twenty-five  pounds  per  head.  In 
1832,  it  had  risen  to  47  pounds ;  but,  railroad  iron  being  then  freed  from 
duty,  the  consumption  of  the  two  following  years  fell  off,  indicating  an  increased 
difficulty  of  obtaining  it.  Thence  to  1841,  the  average  power  of  consumption 
appears  to  have  remained  almost  perfectly  stationary ;  but,  in  the  two 
following  years,  we  find  it  receding  rapidly.  As  the  tariff  of  1842  comes 
into  operation,  there  is  a  rapid  increase  in  the  power  of  consumption,  indi- 
cating a  diminution  in  the  amount  of  labour  required  for  its  purchase ;  and 
the  year  1846-7  shows  it  attaining  a  point  far  higher  than  ever  before  known, 
being  almost  100  pounds  per  head.  With  the  year  1847-8,  the  domestic 
production  declined  in  its  ratio  to  population,  and  the  import  increased ;  but 
the  total  quantity  in  market  was  very  little  greater  than  in  the  previous  year, 
yet  the  close  of  that  year  showed  an  accumulation  of  stock  on  hand.  In 
1849  we  find  a  rapid  increase  of  import  and  diminution  of  production,  yet 
the  total  quantity  brought  to  market  is  less  per  head  than  in  1846-7,  and  of 
that  there  is  already  so  vast  an  accumulation  that  the  seaports  are  filled  with 
it,  and  the  stock  on  hand  at  the  furnaces  is  such,  that  many  will  be  forced  to 
stop  work,  as  numbers  have  already  done.f  It  is  obvious  that  the  difficulty 


*  Railroad  iron,  free  of  duty. 

•f  Pennsylvania  is  the  great  iron-producing  State  of  the  Union,  and  we  may  form 
some  idea  of  the  accumulation  of  stock,  or  the  diminution  of  production,  there,  from  the 
following  facts.  The  pig  iron  sent  to  market  by  the  one  route  of  the  Chesapeake  and 
Delaware  Canal,  from  the  opening  of  navigation  to  the  first  of  September,  1848, 
amounted  to  24,000  tons;  whereas,  in  the  same  period  of  1849,  it  fell  to  little  over  12,000 
tons,  and  the  bar  iron  from  5000  to  1250  tons. 


THE    HARMONY    OF   INTERESTS.  13 

of  obtaining  iron  is  increasing,  and  that  the  consumption  is  rapidly  diminish- 
ing, with  a  tendency  to  still  further  diminution. 

The  important  facts  to  be  derived  from  this  examination  are — first,  the 
small  increase  of  importation  that  results,  even  temporarily,  from  the  abo- 
lition of  the  duty.  During  the  period  from  1830  to  1832,  railroad  iron  paid 
duty,  and  yet  the  importation  trebled  in  that  time,  and  the  last  year  was  far 
the  greatest  of  the  three.  For  nine  years  after,  it  was  totally  free  from  duty ; 
and,  although  much  of  that  which  was  imported  for  railroads  is  said  to  have 
been  used  for  other  purposes,  the  increase  averages  but  seventy  per  cent.  By 
the  tariff  of  1841,*  railroad  iron  was  rendered  subject  to  duty,  and  the  import 
of  rolled  iron  in  1842  and  1843  was  46,000  tons,  being  two-thirds  more 
than  was  imported  free  of  duty  in  1834. 

Second.  That,  under  the  protective  tariff  of  1828,  the  total  consumption, 
per  head,  increased,  in  four  years,  fifty  per  cent.  That,  under  the  system 
which  prevailed  from  1832  to  1842-3,  consumption  was  almost  stationary, 
and  was  probably  less  per  head  than  it  had  been  at  the  commencement  of 
the  period.  That,  under  the  tariff  of  1842,  the  average  consumption  in- 
creased in  the  first  year  from  thirty-nine  to  fifty-seven  pounds,  and  that,  in 
1846  and  1847,  it  attained  the  height  of  almost  one  hundred  pounds  per 
head,  exceeding  by  150  per  cent,  the  consumption  of  the  free  trade  period  of 
1842-5. 

If,  now,  we  look  at  the  single  article  of  railroad  iron,  we  find  similar 
results.  Up  to  1842,  not  a  single  ton  of  it  had  ever  been  made  in  this 
country,  and  yet  the  average  consumption  of  rolled  iron,  of  every  description, 
in  the  ten  years  from  1832  to  1842,  free  of  duty  as  it  was,  was  but  about 
36,000  tons.  Commenced  only  in  1843,  the  manufacture  of  railroad  bars 
in  1845  had  already  reached  about  50,000  tons,  and,  in  1847,  it  had 
attained  nearly  100,000  tons,  and  yet  the  average  import  of  rolled  iron  for 
the  four  years  was  nearly  as  great  as  before.  The  domestic  production  has 
now  fallen  almost  to  nothing,  and  yet  the  import  has  been  only  174,000,  of 
which,  it  is  said,  there  is  now  on  hand  a  supply  adequate  to  meet  the  demand, 
such  as  it  is  at  present,  for  two  years  to  come. 

The  questions  to  be  settled  are — Which  is  the  system  under  which  iron  is 
most  cheaply  furnished  ?  Which  is  the  one  under  which  it  is  most  readily 
obtained  by  those  who  desire  to  use  it  ?  If  free-trade  be  the  one,  then  the 
power  to  import,  under  it,  ought  to  grow  more  rapidly  than  the  power  to 
produce  diminishes ;  but  we  see  here  that  the  power  to  import  diminishes 
with  the  power  to  produce,  and  grows  with  the  growth  of  the  power  of  pro- 
duction, being  greatest  under  protection. 

COAL. 

Anthracite.  Foreign.  Total.    Consumption  per 

Ton*.  Tom.  Tons.     1000  of  populat'n 

1821  to  1829,  average,          87,000  80,000  67,000  6  tons. 

1830 142,000  64,000  196,000  15 

1831, 216,000  84,000  250,000  19 

1832 318,000  66,000  384,000  28 

1833 395,000  85,000  480,000  34 

1834 451,000  67,000  518,000  85 

]  835  to  1836,  .     .     .  671,000  78,000  749,000  50 

1837, 881,000  140,000  1,021.000  64 

1838  to  1841,  .     .     .  850,000  145,000  995,000  58 

1842, 1,108,000  141,000  1,249,000  69 

*  This  was  a  provisional  tariff,  having  for  its  sole  object  the  increase  of  revenue,  and 
was  limited  to  alterations  in  a  few  articles. 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 


1843,      .     .    . 

Anthracite. 
Tons. 
.      .          1,312,000 

Foreign. 
Tons. 
65,000 

87,000 
86,000 
156,000 
148,000 

196,000 
200,000 

<,-+ 
Total.      Consumption  per 
Tons.       1000  of  populat'n. 
1,367,000             74 
1,718,000             90 
2,109,000          108 
2,499,000          125 
3,130,000          152 

8,285,000          156 
8,400,000          156 

1844,   .     .     . 

.     .     .      1,631,000 

1845,      .     .     . 

.     .        2,023,000 

1846    .     .     . 

.     .     .      2,343,000 

1847,     .     .     . 

.     .        2,982,000 

1848,  .     .     . 

.     .    .      8,089,000 

1849. 

8,200,000 

In  this  case,  it  has  been  necessary  to  separate  the  years  1842  and  1843, 
because  of  the  whole  of  the  latter  coming  within  the  action  of  the  tariff  of  1842,* 
the  account  of  the  domestic  production  being  made  up  to  the  close,  instead 
of  the  middle  of  the  year,  as  in  the  case  of  imports. 

The  facts  that  here  present  themselves  are  worthy  of  careful  consideration. 

"When  we  produced  little  coal,  we  imported  little,  the  total  consumption 
being  only  six  tons  per  thousand  of  the  population.  As  the  production 
grew,  the  import  grew,  and  thus,  in  1846  and  1847,  when  we  produced 
eighty  times  as  much  as  in  the  period  from  1821  to  1829,  we  imported  five 
times  more. 

From  1829  to  1834,  and  thence  to  1837,  the  increase  of  consumption  was 
rapid.  Thence  to  1841,  it  diminished  ten  per  cent.  In  1842,  it  was 
scarcely  higher  than  it  had  been  five  years  before.  In  the  five  years  which 
followed,  it  rose  from  69  to  152  tons,  showing  a  rapid  diminution  in  the 
quantity  of  labour  required  to  be  given  in  exchange  for  it.  In  1848,  under 
the  action  of  the  tariff  of  1846,  the  production  became  almost  stationary, 
and  the  diminished  power  of  consumption  is  shown  in  the  fact  that  although 
the  quantity  sent  to  market  maintains  the  same  ratio  to  population,  much  of 
it  is  sold  at  a  loss  to  the  producer. 

With  every  step  in  the  growth  of  the  home  production  of  coal,  the  money 
price  has  steadily  diminished.  That  of  a  ton  of  anthracite  in  1826,  in 
Philadelphia,  was  six,  eight,  and  sometimes  ten  dollars,  and  yet  the  whole 
import  was  only  970,000  bushels,  or  about  30,000  tons.  In  1846,  the  price  of 
anthracite  was  about  four  dollars,  and  yet  the  import  was  156,000  tons.  It 
would  appear  from  this,  that  when  a  nation  is  capable  of  supplying  itself, 
other  nations,  desiring  to  sell,  must  come  to  them  and  sell  at  the  lowest 
price,  and  the  consumption  is  large;  but  when  it  cannot  supply  itself,  it 
must  go  abroad  to  seek  supplies,  and  pay  the  highest  price,  and  then  con- 
sumption is  small.  Applying  this  to  iron,  we  find  that  when  we  had  to  seek 
abroad  for  nearly  all  our  supply,  it  sold  at  prices  twice  or  thrice  as  great  as 
those  at  which  it  is  now  obtained. 

In  1846  and  1847,  notwithstanding  the  vast  increase  in  the  supply  of 
coal,  so  great  was  the  consumption  that  we  had  to  go  abroad  to  make  up  the 
deficiency,  and  to  pay  the  high  prices  which  our  own  demand  largely  tended 
to  produce,  a  state  of  things  which  could  not  have  happened  had  we  been 
prepared  to  supply  the  whole  demand. 

It  remains  to  be  seen  whether  the  converse  of  this  proposition  may  not  be 
true,  to  wit,  that  when  a  nation  makes  a  market  at  home  for  nearly  all  its 
products,  other  nations  have  to  come  and  seek  what  they  require,  and  pay 
the  highest  price;  and  that,  when  it  does  not  make  a  market  at  home, 
markets  must  be  sought  abroad,  and  then  sales  must  be  made  at  the  lowest 
prices.  If  both  of  these  be  true,  it  would  follow  that  the  way  to  sell  at 
the  highest  prices  and  buy  at  the  lowest  is  to  buy  and  sell  at  home. 

*  It  came  into  action  on  the  80th  of  August  of  that  year. 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 


15 


COTTON. 

IMPORT   OP  COTTON   MANUFACTURE. 
Tears  ending 

September  30,  1821  to  1829,  average,  $9,454,000 

1830, 7,862,000 

«     1831 16,090,000 

«     1832 10,399,000 

"     1833 7,660,000 

"     1834, 10,145,000 

«     1835  to  1841, 12,000  — j...  9,600,000 

"     1842  to  June  30,  1843,  average 7,184,000 

June  30,   1844, 13,641,000 

1845, 13,863,000 

1846, 13,500,000 

1847, 16,071,000 

«     1848 $18,412,000  —  |...  15,582,000 

"     1849, 15,180,000  —  ^...  12,650,000 


Per  head. 
84ct8. 

61 

1-21 
76 
54 
70 


76  av. 


59 

39 

72 

71 

67* 

78 

74 
56 


The  number  of  yards  of  cloth  imported  in  10  years  is  thus  given.  I  have 
been  unable  to  complete  this  table,  or  it  should  be  given  in  full.  I  give  all 
I  have  met  with  : 

1831,  68,577,000 

1835,  53,974,000 

1836 56,931,000 

1837,  23,774,000 

1838 20,240,000 

1839,  42,418,000 

1840 20,011,000 

1842-3,  8,936,000 

1844-5,  84,500,000 

1845-6 36,800,000 

The  differences  here  appear  much  more  striking  tuan  in  the  table  above. 
The  diminution  of  consumption  under  the  free-trade  system  is  very  regular, 
and  the  increase  under  protection  nearly  as  much  so. 

Owing  to  the  variety  of  cotton  goods  imported,  it  is  difficult  to  estimate 
the  weight  of  cotton  contained  in  them  ;  but,  in  the  following  table,  I  have 
made  a  rude  estimate,  with  a  view  to  show  the  growth  of  domestic  con- 
sumption. It  must  be  borne  in  mind  that  a  large  portion  of  the  foreign 
commodities  are  of  the  finer  and  more  costly  descriptions,  and  that  the 
weight  is  therefore  small  when  compared  with  the  value. 

Taken  by  Taken  by  Per  head, 

Northern  Southern  domes-    Per  head.  Total, 

Crop  of                                                      manufacturers,  manufacture,     tic.        foreign,  p.  head. 

1825-6  to  1829-30,  average,  bales  110,000            4  Ibs.   1J  Ibs.   5} 

1830-31 182,000           6$        1            6J 

1831-32,     173,000           5£        2            7fc 

1832-33 194,000     6*    1J    6f 

1833-34,  196,000     6*    Of    6| 

1834-35,  216,000     5|   1J    7 

7* 


1835-36,  to  1841-42,  average,  ...  263,000 
1842-43,  325,000 

1843-44 847,000 

1844-45 389,000 

1845-46,  423,000 

1846-47,  428,000 

1847-48 631,000 

1848-49,    518,000 


6* 
7 


30,000 
40,000 

75,000 
100,000 


1 
Of 

H 

H 


12 


!• 
10 
10| 

13* 


16  THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 

In  estimating  the  domestic  consumption,  I  have  throughout  taken  the 
bale  at  four  hundred  pounds,  although  aware  that  there  has  been  a  gradual 
increase  of  the  weight.  This  change  would  be  important  to  be  considered, 
if  it  were  my  object  to  compare  1847  with  the  distant  year  1831 ;  but  it  is 
unimportant  when  the  object  in  view  is  the  comparison  of  years  which  are 
near  together,  as  is  the  fact. 

The  results  in  this  case  correspond  almost  precisely  with  those  obtained 
from  the  examination  of  iron  and  coal.  The  home  consumption  of  the  crop 
of  1834—5,  per  head,  was  almost  fifty  per  cent,  greater  than  the  average  of 
previous  years,  while  the  import  remained  almost  undisturbed.  Under  the 
Compromise,  consumption  appears  to  have  remained  almost  perfectly  sta- 
ti&nary,  the  increase  of  domestic  production  being  compensated  by  diminished 
importation.  In  1842-3,  the  consumption  per  head  was  scarcely  greater 
than  it  had  been  eight  years  before,  when  it  should  have  doubled.  With 
the  operation  of  the  tariff  of  1842,  we  find  the  consumption  of  domestic 
products  75  per  cent,  greater,  while  the  import  is  also  almost  doubled. 
It  would  appear  obvious,  that  the  power  to  obtain  clothing  in  return  for 
labour  increased  in  both  protective  periods,  and  diminished  with  the  approach 
to  free  trade.  With  1848-9,  the  demand  for  Northern  manufactures  dimi- 
nished; and,  as  many  mills  are  now  closed  that  were  at  work  but  a  few 
months  since,*  there  is  reason  to  believe  that  the  power  to  obtain  clothing 
in  return  for  labour  is  in  a  course  of  gradual  diminution. 

A  portion  of  the  cotton  worked  up  at  home  has  been  exported,  and  was 
therefore  not  consumed  at  home.  To  have  made  allowance  for  this  would 
have  made  the  table  very  complicated,  and  it  did  not  appear  to  be  necessary. 
as  the  proportions  were  well  preserved,  having  been  about  a  million  or 
dollars  when  the  home  consumption  was  100,000  bales,  two  millions  when 
it  rose  to  200,000,  three  millions  out  of  300,000,  and  five  millions  out  of 
500,000  bales. 

WOOL. 

IMPORT    OF    WOOLLENS. 

Tears  ending  Per  head. 

September  30,  1821  to  1829,  average,    .        .        $8,900,000  79  cents 

45 
95 
75 

93 
82 

"           1835  to  1841,  av.,  $13,950,000—  £  11,160,000  69 

"           1842  to  June  30,  1843,        .        .  6,300,000  34 

June  30,      1844, 9,475,000  50 

1845, 10,666,000  65 

"  1846,  .  .  .  .  .  10,089,030  50 

"  1847 10,570,000  51 

"  1848,  .  .  $15,280,000— i  13,000,000  62 

1849,      .        .      18,704,000  — f  11,400,000  58 

•  Within  the'  last  six  months  there  have  been  been  many  failures  among  those  engaged 
in  the  business;  and,  in  these  oases,  tho  mills  are  not  only  closed,  but  likely  so  to  remair.. 

The  import  into  Cincinnati  may  be  taken  as  evidence  of  the  course  of  affairs  in  t>e 
West,  and  here  we  have  the  same  result : 

1846-7, 12,528  bales. 

1847-8, 13,470 

1848-9, 0,058 

We  see,  thus,  that  notwithstanding  the  extreme  lowness  of  price,  the  consumption  has 
diminished. 


1830,  . 
1831, 

6,766,000 
12,627,000 

1832, 

9,992,000 

1833, 

13,262,000 

1834, 

.  11.879.000 

THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 


17 


Prioi  to  the  passage  of  the  tariff  of  1824,  the  woollen  manufacture  was 
in  a  very  depressed  condition;  and,  in  1825,  the  number  of  sheep  was  only 
fourteen  millions,*  producing  about  thirty-five  millions  of  pounds  of  wool. 
Thenceforward  the  number  increased,  and  the  crop  of  1829,  1830  and 
1831,  was  estimated  at  fifty  millions  of  pounds,  the  produce  of  twenty  mil- 
lions of  sheep.  At  the  close  of  1834,  there  had  been  a  further  increase,* 
but  to  what  extent  we  are  not  informed;  but  the  value  of  the  woollen 
manufacture  was  estimated  at  65  millions  of  dollars  against  40  millions  in 
1831.  In  1840,  the  census  returns  show  but  19,311,000,  the  number 
having  diminished  while  the  population  had  largely  increased.  The  depres- 
sion of  1841-2  was  accompanied  by  the  sacrifice  of  sheep  to  a  considerable 
extent;  yet  so  rapid  was  the  subsequent  change,  that  the  number,  in  1845, 
was  estimated  at  twenty-five  millions,  f  and  in  1848  at  twenty-eight  millions. 
Ohio  had,  in  1846,  only  2,065,000 ;  but,  in  1848,  the  number  had  risen  to 
3,677,000.  The  number  in  New  York,  in  1845,  was  6,443,000,  and,  sub- 
sequently to  that  date,  it  had  largely  increased. 

The  deliveries  on  the  New  York  canals,  and  at  Pittsburgh,  in  1840,  were 
one-fifth  of  the  total  production  by  the  census;  and,  since  that  date,  they 
are  thus  stated — 


1841, 
1842, 
1843, 
1844, 


6,094,035 
4,823,881 
5,713,289 
6,798,769 


1845, 
1846, 
1847, 
1848, 


13,267,609 
12,269,537 
16,325,987 
11,665,540 


Even  this  does  not  mark  the  whole  increase,  as  the  woollens  factories  of 
the  interior  of  New  York  and  other  States  absorb  much  that  would  otherwise 
pass  on  the  canals,  destined  for  distant  places. 

With  these  very  imperfect  data,  we  may  now  form  some  estimate  of  the 
consumption  of  this  most  important  commodity.  In  estimating  the  weight 
contained  in  the  cloth  imported,  I  have  taken  it  as  being  worth  one  dollar 
per  pound,  and  therefore  the  figures  which  represent  the  value  per  head, 
give  also  the  weight  per  head. 

Average  of 
1821  to  1829, 

1830, 

1831,  . 

1832, 

1833,  . 

1834, 

1835  to  1841, 

1842  and  1843, 

1844, 

1845,  . 

1846,  . 

1847,  . 

1848,  . 
1849, 

By  the  tariff  of  1846,  the  duty  on  many  descriptions  of  foreign  wool  was 
raised,  while  that  on  cloths  was  lowered;  which  accounts  for  the  great  dimi- 
nution in  the  quantity  imported. 

That  this  is  very  incorrect  there  is  no  doubt ;  but  it  will  enable  us  to 
make  some  comparison  between  the  increase  of  imports  as  compared  with 
the  diminution  of  home  production.  From  1830  to  1834,  the  production 


Millions 

Pounds  of 

Imports. 

Total,  domestic 

Per  head. 

TAt.l 

of  sheep. 

wool. 

Pounds. 

manufacture. 

t 

om.ifcr. 

.      15 

37,500,000 

2,000,000 

39,500,000 

3.50 

4-29 

20 

50,000,000 

669,000 

60,669,000 

3-90 

4-35 

.     21 

52,500,000 

5,622,000 

58,122,000 

4-40 

5-35 

22 

65,000,000 

4,042,000 

59,062,000 

4-40 

5-16 

.     23 

67,500,000 

950,000 

68,450.000 

4-15 

6-08 

24 

60,000,000 

2,341,000 

62,341,000 

4-30 

6-12 

.     22 

es.'wo.ooo 

10,000,000 

65,000,000 

4- 

4-69 

19 

48,000,000 

7,600,000 

65,500,000 

3- 

3-34 

22 

65,000,000 

23,800,000 

78,800,000 

4-10 

4-60 

.    24 

60,000,000 

28,800,000 

88,800,000 

4-50 

6-05 

26 

65,000,000 

16,500,000 

81,500,000 

4-10 

4-60 

.     27 

67,500,000 

8,460,000 

75,960,000 

3-70 

4-20 

28 

70,000,000 

11,380,000 

81,380,000 

3-90 

4-52 

. 

. 

17,860,000 

*  Pitkin's  Statistics,  p.  488. 

*  Merchant's  Magazine,  Vol.  XXI.,  p.  217. 


f  Patent  Office  Report,  1847,  p.  213. 


18 


THE    HARMONY   OF    INTERESTS. 


crew,  and  the  import  was  large.  From  1835  to  1841,  the  former  largely 
diminished  in  its  ratio  to  population;  and  the  foreign  cloths  paid  for  in  that 
period  fell  to  sixty-nine  cents  per  head.  In  the  revenue  period,  from  June, 
1841,  to  June,  1843,  production  was  very  small,  and  the  import  fell  to  about 
thirty-four  cents  per  head.  In  the  four  succeeding  years,  both  grew  rapidly. 
Under  the  tariff  of  1846,  there  is  a  slight  increase  of  import;  but  the  home 
manufacture  has  diminished.  The  power  to  obtain  cloth  in  exchange  for 
labour  has,  therefore,  invariably  grown  in  the  protective  periods,  and  dimi- 
nished with  every  approach  to  free  trade. 


PRODUCTION   OF  LEAD. 

The  arrivals  at  New  Orleans  have  been  as  follows : — 

figs. 
1828-'29,*  average,  164,000 

1830,  .        .        254,000 

1831,  .        .        .     151,000 
1882,         .        .         122,000 
1833,     .        .        .     180,000 


Pigs. 

1834,   . 

202,000 

1845, 

1835  to  1841,  . 

298,000 

1846, 

1842,   . 

473,000 

1847, 

1843, 

671,000 

1848, 

1844,   . 

639,000 

1849, 

Pigs. 
732,000 
785,000 
659,000 
606,000 
508,000 


We  see  here  that  the  average  of  the  seven  years,  from  1835  to  1841,  was 
little  greater  than  the  product  of  1830.  The  temporary  tariff  of  September, 
1841,  raised  the  duty  to  five  cents  per  pound,  and  production  rose  to 
almost  800,000  pigs.  Since  the  passage  of  that  of  1846,  it  has  fallen  to 
500,000,  and  for  this  diminished  supply  there  is  little  demand. 

We  have  thus  far  seen  that  the  application  of  labour  and  capital  to  the 
opening  of  mines,  the  erection  of  furnaces,  mills,  and  factories,  and  to  the 
conducting  of  such  works,  was  arrested  at  the  close  of  1834,  and  that  it 
did  not  recommence  until  after  the  passage  of  the  tariff  of  1842.  We  have 
also  seen  that  it  increased  rapidly  from  1843  to  1847,  that  it  became  sta- 
tionary in  1848,  and  is  now  retrograding.  Both  seek  to  be  employed,  and 
if  denied  employment  at  home  they  must  seek  it  abroad.  If  employed  at 
home,  there  is  a  tendency  to  concentration  and  combination  of  action.  If 
sent  abroad,  there  is  a  tendency  to  dispersion,  with  diminished  power  of  com- 
bination. One  of  these  courses  tends  to  increase  the  reward  of  labour,  the 
other  to  diminish  it.  With  a  view  to  ascertain  the  effects  of  the  two  systems, 
I  give, 

First,  The  amount  of  IMMIGRATION,  as  showing  how  far  the  wages  of 
labour  tended  to  invite  the  people  of  foreign  nations  to  come  and  reside 
amongst  us,  and, 

Second,  The  amount  of  SHIPPING  built,  to  show  how  far  the  establishment 
of  an  import  trade  of  MEN,  the  cargo  that  pays  the  highest  freights,  tended  to 
increase  the  facilities  provided  for  the  export  of  merchandise : — 


EMIGRATION. 


1821  to  1829,    .   .  12,000 

1830 27,153 

1831 23,074 

1832 46,287 

1833,   ....  56,547 

1834 65,335 

1835  to  1841,    .   .  67,520 


1842-3, 

1844, 

1845, 

1846, 

1847, 

1848, 

1849, 


88,133 

74,607 
102,415 
147,051 
234,742 
229,492 
299,610 


•••• 

Those  are  the  earliest  years  for  which  I  have  met  with  any  account*. 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS  19 


Total  shipping  built           Per  thousand.                                       Per  million  of 
tons.                          of  population.           Steamers  built      population. 

821 

to  1829,     average,  90,000 

8     1823-29 

35 

3-1 

1830, 

.            . 

58,000 

4-5 

37 

3 

1831, 

.            . 

85,000 

6-4 

34 

2-6 

1832, 

.            . 

144,000 

10-5 

100 

7-2 

1833, 

.            . 

161,000 

11-4 

65 

4-6 

1834, 

. 

118,000 

8-1 

68 

4-7 

1835 

to  1841,       . 

108,000 

6-6 

92 

6-7 

1842-3,     . 

91,000 

5 

108 

6-8 

1844, 

(nine  months,) 

103,000=137,000 

7-2 

163=217 

11-4 

1845, 

.            . 

146,000 

7-5 

163 

8-5 

1846, 

.            . 

188,000 

9-4 

225 

11-5 

1847, 

. 

243,000 

11-8 

198 

9-7 

1848, 

• 

316,000 

15 

175 

8-3 

1849, 

. 

256,000 

11-8 

208 

9-6 

We  see  here  a  large  increase  in  the  years  from  1830  to  1834,  followed  by 
a  gradual  diminution  until  we  reach  1843,  after  which  the  rise  is  very  rapid. 

On  a  former  occasion,  I  stated  that  immigration  was  not  affected  by 
changes  of  policy  until  after  the  lapse  of  more  time  than  was  required  for 
other  of  the  subjects  we  have  had  under  consideration.  A  change  tends  to 
raise  or  depress  the  value  of  labour — to  raise  or  depress  the  price  of  men — 
and  after  a  rise  has  been  effected,  men  come  to  offer  their  labour  for  sale. 
It  will  be  seen  that  the  number  in  1831  was  less  than  in  1830,  and  that 
it  was  not  until  1832  that  it  rose.  With  the  exception  of  1835,  it  con- 
tinued to  rise  until  1836—7,  when  it  reached  78,083,  after  which  it  fell.  In 
1843-4,  it  felt  the  effect  of  the  disastrous  year  1842,  and  the  number  was 
only  74,000;  and  it  was  not  until  1844-5  that  it  began  to  grow  rapidly. 
At  the  present  moment  it  is  large,  because  of  the  great  demand  for  labour  in 
the  years  that  have  passed,  but  it  is  now  feeling  the  effect  of  the  present 
diminished  demand,  and  consequent  fall  of  wages. 

Such,  likewise,  is  the  case  with  shipping.  The  first  effect  of  a  rise  of 
wages  is  to  increase  the  power  to  obtain  the  necessaries  of  life,  and  it  is  not 
until  after  that  shall  have  been  done  that  the  power  to  consume  foreign  com- 
modities tends  materially  to  increase.  The  increase  of  ship-building  did  not 
commence  until  1832.  It  fell  off  in  1838.  Thus  far  the  movement  is  pre- 
cisely the  same  as  that  of  immigration.  It  recommenced  in  1844,  somewhat 
in  advance  of  immigration.  It  is  now  maintained  by  that,  and  that  alone, 
and  when  that  is  falling  off,  it  must  fall  too.  The  close  connection  between 
the  power  to  secure  valuable  return-freights  and  the  power  to  build  ships,  is 
shown  in  the  following  table,  in  which  the  movements  of  both  are  shown : — 

Immigration.  Shipping  built  Immigration.        Shipping  built. 


1821-81,  aver.,  14,000  .    .   87,000* 

1832,  .  45,000    .    144,000 

1833,  .    .   56,000  .    .  161,000 
1884,  .     65,000   .    118,000 

1835,  .    .   63,000  .    .   60,000 

1836,  .  62,000   .    113,000 

1837,  .    .   78,000  .    .  122,000 


1848,  .    .  76,000  .    .  .  64,000 

1844,  .    74,000  .    140,000 

1845,  .    .  102,000  .    .  146,000 

1846,  .   147,000  .    188,000 

1847,  .    .  239,742  .    .  246,000 

1848,  .   229,492  .    816,000 

1849,  .    .  299,610  .    .  256,000 


1838-42,  aver.,  76,000   .    120  000 

The  amount  of  shipping  at  present  employed  is,  probably,  less  than  it  was 
two  years  since.  A  vast  quantity  now  lies  idle  in  the  ports  of  California,  and 
it  is  to  replace  it  that  ships  are  now  being  built.'f  How  far  the  immigration 

*  Average  of  last  two  years  only  71,000. 

•(•  The  reason  for  now  building  ships  may  be  found  in  the  fact  stated  in  the  following 
paragraph,  which  I  take  from  one  of  the  papers  of  the  day : — 

"It  is  a  remarkable  fact,  that  of  all  the  ships  arrived  in  the  bay  of  San  Francisco  from 


20  THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 

of  the  ensuing  year  is  likely  to  afford  inducements  for  increasing  our  tonnage 
may  be  judged  from  the  following  comparative  view  of  the  arrivals  at  New 
York  in  the  last  four  months  of  the  two  past  years,  as  compared  with  the 
present  one,  furnished  by  the  Commissioners  of  Immigration  : — 

September,  October,  November,  and  December,  1847.  1848.  1849. 

44,137    61,310     48,715 

Instead  of  an  increase  of  about  forty  per  cent.,  there  is  a  diminution  of 
above  twenty  per  cent.;  and  that  this  decrease  must  go  on,  will  be  obvious 
from  the  facts  contained  in  the  following  paragraph,  which  I  take  from  the 
New  York  Herald: — 

"EMIGRATION  TO  EUROPE. — The  fine  and  well-tried  packet-ship,  Ashburton,  sailed 
yesterday  for  Liverpool,  having  on  board  104  passengers,  who  having  taken  a 
glimpse  at  'the  land  of  liberty,'  and  not  finding  it  the  El  Dorado  they  expected, 
came  to  the  conclusion  of  returning  homeward.  They  were  principally  natives  of 
Ireland.  The  Jamestown  and  Constellation  sail  to-morrow  with  similar  cargoes." 

Every  man  who  thus  returns  prevents  the  emigration  of  a  hundred  that 
would  otherwise  have  crossed  the  Atlantic. 

I  propose  now  to  show  the  tendency  to  DEPOPULATION,  as  marked  by  the 
sale  of  PUBLIC  LANDS,  compared  with  immigration : — 

1821-29, 
1880, 
1881,  . 
1832, 
1833,  . 
1834, 
1835-41, 
1842, 

At  no  period  of  our  history  has  the  process  of  depopulation  proceeded 
with  the  vigour  that  is  now  manifested.  Emigrants  from  Europe  are  now 
returning  home,  disappointed ;  while  the  emigration  to  the  West  is  almost 
marvellous.  The  quantity  of  land  sold  does  not,  as  I  understand,  give  any 
clue  to  the  quantity  occupied,  because  of  the  facilities  afforded  by  the  law  to 
squatters. 

It  is  estimated,  we  are  told,  that  from  thirty  thousand  to  fifty  thousand 
have  been  added  to  the  population  of  Iowa  within  six  weeks,  and  that,  by  the 
close  of  navigation,  the  population  will  have  increased  one-fourth  since  the 
1st  of  September.  Such  is  the  course  of  things  in  regard  to  all  the  new 
States,  west  and  south-west;  and,  if  to  this  be  added  the  emigration  to  Cali- 
fornia, it  may  be  doubted  if  the  population  of  the  old  States  will  be  as  large 
at  the  close  of  the  year  as  it  was  at  the  commencement. 

the  Atlantic  ports,  some  of  which  have  been  anchored  there  for  near  four  months,  not  one 
is  advertised  for  a  return  trip  home.  This,  of  course,  is  easily  accounted  for.  There  is 
no  freight  to  come  back,  but  passengers  and  gold  dust,  and  as  these  mostly  prefer  the 
steamers,  the  ships  have  nothing  to  do  but  to  wait  and  see  what  circumstances  may  do 
for  them.  Meanwhile,  the  absence  of  so  many  vessels,  and  the  improbability  of  an  early 
return,  are  having  a  strengthening  influence  upon  home  freights.  Rates  ere  long  must 
rapidly  advance;  and  were  it  spring  time  now,  instead  of  fall,  I  think  it  would  be  diffi- 
cult to  negotiate  engagements  at  present  prices." 

A  vast  amount  of  capital  has  been  locked  up  in  ships  that  are  idle,  and  others  must 
now  be  built  to  take  their  place.  If  they  were  back  again,  ship-building  would  now  ba 
entirely  suspended. 

f  To  this  must  be  added  the  occupation  of  Texas  and  Oregon. 

*  To  these  must  be  added  the  occupation  of  California. 


Land  sold. 

Per  head  of 

Land  gold. 

Per  head  of 

Acres. 

Immigration. 

Acres.            Immigration. 

average, 

825,000  . 

.    69 

1848, 

.     1,605,000    . 

.  21 

1,244.000 

46 

1844, 

1,754,000 

.      28 

,        , 

1,929,000 

.    88 

1845, 

.     1,848,000    . 

.  18 

. 

2,777,000 

61 

1846, 

2,263,000 

.      15 

.        . 

2,462,000  . 

.     44 

1847, 

.    2,521,000    . 

.  11 

. 

4,658,000 

70 

1848, 

2,747,000 

.       13J 

average, 

7,150,000 

.    105f 

1849, 

n.t  obtained.              . 

•       t 

. 

1,129,000 

11 

THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 


21 


PRODUCTION   OF   FOOD. 

The  power  to  supply  food  to  those  who  come  to  live  amongst  us,  and  also 
to  send  it  abroad  in  exchange  for  other  commodities,  may  be  taken  as  some 
evidence  of  the  productiveness  of  labour  applied  to  its  cultivation,  and  I 
therefore  give  the  following  statement  of  the  export  and  import  of  wheat  and 
flour,  in  bushels  of  the  former : — 

Population 
Imports.  by  immigration. 

12,000 
27,000 
23,000 
45,000 
66,000 


Exports. 

1821-29,  average,  4,400,000 


1830, 
1831, 
1832, 
1833, 
1834, 

1835, 
1836, 
1887, 
1888, 
1889, 
1840, 
1841, 

1842, 
1843, 
1844, 
1845, 
1846, 
1847, 
1848, 
1849, 


6,100,000 
9,441,000 
4,407,000 
4,811,000 
4,113,000 
8,914,000 
2,529,000 
1,610,000 
2,247,000 
4,712,000 
11,198,000 
8,447,000 
7,237,000 
4,519,000 
7,751,000 
6,365,000 
13,061,000 
26,312,000 
12,631,000 
9,500,000 


311,000 

650,000 

4,000,000 

927,000 


20,000 
369,000 


65,000 


63,000 


72,000 


88,000 

74,000 
102,000 
147,000 
234,742 

229,000 
299,610 


Depopulation. 
69 
46 
83 
61 
44 
70 


105 
Texas  and  Oregon. 


11 

21 
23 
18 
15 

L1j  Mexico  and 
13  ("California. 


It  is  here  shown  that,  notwithstanding  the  rapid  growth  of  manufactures 
in  the  period  from  1830  to  1834,  the  export  of  food  was  not  only  maintained 
but  it  increased.  The  tendency  to  depopulation  had  diminished,  and  the  power 
to  obtain  iron  to  assist  in  the  work  of  cultivation  had  increased.  Thereafter,  with 
the  increasing,  tendency  to  depopulation,  as  immigration  and  manufac- 
tures and  the  power  to  obtain  iron  became  stationary,  the  production 
of  food  so  far  diminished  that  the  price  rose  to  such  a  point  as  to  render  it 
profitable  to  import  it;  and  it  may  be  doubted  if,  notwithstanding  the  in- 
crease of  numbers,  the  whole  quantity  produced  between  1835  and  1840 
was  greater  than  in  the  five  previous  years.  From  1843,  we  find  it  gra- 
dually increasing,  notwithstanding  the  vast  amount  of  labour  employed 
in  producing  coal,  iron,  cotton  and  woollen  goods,  ships,  steamboats,  &c. 
How  great  was  the  increase  may  be  seen  by  the  following  comparison  of  the 
returns  under  the  census  of  1840,  and  the  Patent  Ofiice  estimates  for 
1847:— 


Wheat. 
1840,  .     .        84,823,000 
1847,     .    .    114,245,000 

Barley. 

4,161,000 
5,649,000 

Oats. 
123,071,000 
167,867,000 

Rye. 

18,645,000 
29,222,000 

Bnckwh't. 

7,291,000 
11,673,000 

Ind.  Corn. 

377,531,000 
539,350,000 

Totals. 
615,522,000 
867,826,000 

Increase,         29,422,000 

1,488,000 

44,797,000 

10,577,000 

4,382,000 

161,819,000 

252,304,000 

We  have  here  an  increase  of  no  less  than  40  per  cent,  in  seven  years, 
during  which  the  increase  of  population  was  but  23  per  cent.  Equally 
divided  among  the  whole  people,  there  would  be  36  bushels  per  head  in  the 
one  case,  and  42  in  the  other;  and  thus  we  see  that  the  increase  in  the  faci- 
lity of  obtaining  the  machinery  of  cultivation  is  attended  by  increase  in  the 
product  of  cultivation;  while  increase  in  the  power  to  produce  cotton  and 
woollen  cloth  enables  the  farmer  to  obtain  for  each  bushel  produced  a  larger 
amount  of  clothing  than  before. 


22  THE    HARMONY    OF   INTERESTS. 


The  net  export 

is  as  follows,  per  head 

of  the  population  :— 

1821  to  1829,     . 

.     -39 

1834, 

.     -29 

1845, 

.       -38 

1880,     . 

•47 

1835  to  1841, 

•25 

1846,     . 

•65 

1831, 

.     -71 

1842-3,     . 

.     -31 

1847, 

.     1-28 

1832,     . 

•32 

1844,     . 

•41 

1848,     . 

•60 

1833, 

.     -35 

1849, 

•45 

We  see,  thus,  that  with  the  exception  of  the  year  of  the  famine  in  Ire- 
land, it  has  never  reached  a  bushel  per  head,  and  that  it  has  invariably 
been  largest  in  the  periods  of  protection — those  periods  in  which  the  largest 
and  most  valuable  home  freights  could  be  obtained.  With  the  approach  to 
free  trade  the  power  to  maintain  trade  has  diminished ;  and  as  we  have  re- 
ceded from  it  and  have  approached  protection,  it  has  increased  with  the 
growth  of  immigration. 

The  effect  of  this  is  seen  in  the  constantly  increasing  quantity  of  Canadian 
produce  that  passes  through  New  York  on  the  way  to  England.  It  is  stated 
that  while  in  1848  only  50,000  barrels  of  Canadian  flour  passed  through 
New  York,  the  quantity  in  1849  that  came  through  by  the  single  route  of 
Oswego  was  200,000  barrels,  and  that  there  were,  in  addition,  623,000 
bushels  of  wheat.  This,  being  of  foreign  production,  has,  of  course,  to  be 
deducted  from  the  amount  of  exports;  but  if  the  import  of  MEN  should 
diminish,  freights  outward  must  rise,  and  the  tendency  to  send  flour  or 
wheat  to  market  through  the  ports  of  the  Union  will  pass  away. 

What  was,  prior  to  the  census  of  1840,  the  production  of  grain,  it  is  not 
now  possible  to  ascertain;  but  we  know  that,  in  the  period  from  1830  to 
1834,  prices  were  moderate  and  consumption  was  large.  It  is  not  probable 
that  it  was  as  much  per  head  as  was  given  by  the  census  for  1840,  because 
the  increased  facilities  of  transportation  in  the  latter  period  enabled  the 
farmer  to  give  more  of  his  labour  to  cultivation.  If  it  be  taken  at  thirty 
bushels  per  head,  it  will  probably  not  vary  greatly  from  the  truth.  In  the 
following  period,  production  was  so  small  that  prices  rose  to  a  point  that 
permitted  importation  from  Europe ;  and  the  advance  so  far  exceeded  that  of 
wages  as  to  cause  almost  universal  disturbance  between  employers  and  work- 
men. It  may  be  doubted  if  it  then  exceeded  twenty-five  bushels  per  head. 
By  degrees,  the  tendency  to  depopulation  diminished;  and,  in  1840,  we  find 
it  thirty-six  bushels,  to  rise  to  forty-two  in  1847.  The  same  causes  that 
diminished  production  in  1836  are  now  again  at  work.  Immense  num- 
bers of  people  are  in  motion  changing  their  places  of  labour;  and  those 
that  have  gone  to  California,  New  Mexico,  the  Salt  Lake,  &c.,  can  scarcely 
be  taken  at  less  than  a  hundred  thousand.  These  men  are  not  now 
producers;  and  thus,  while  we  have  this  year  added  to  our  population 
280,000  persons  from  abroad  requiring  to  be  fed,  we  have  exported  great 
numbers  who  have  not  only  ceased  to  be  producers,  but  have  taken  with 
them  vast  quantities  of  food.  It  may  fairly  be  doubted  if  the  product  of 
this  year,  per  head,  exceeds  thirty-eight  to  forty  bushels;  and  hence  it  is,  in 
part,  that  the  prices  are  even  thus  far  maintained,  Nevertheless,  there  is  a 
gradual  tendency  to  a  fall  of  prices,  showing  a  power  of  consumption  dimin 
ishing  in  a  greater  ratio  than  that  of  production. 

That  the  power  to  obtain  food  in  return  to  labour  diminished  greatly 
between  1835  and  1839  must  be  within  the  recollection  of  all  who  were 
familiar  with  the  events  of  that  period.  Never  has  there  been  experienced 
in  this  country  so  much  anxiety  relative  to  the  result  of  the  harvest  as  was  felt 
in  1838.  From  that  time,  the  tendency  to  dispersion  diminished ;  and,  in 
1839  and  1840,  labour  commanded  good  supplies  of  food,  as  is  obvious  from 
the  fact  that  immigration  rose,  attaining,  in  1841-2,  the  height  of  101,000. 
The  value  of  labour  and  food  had,  however,  by  that  time  greatly  fallen,  and, 


THE    HARMONY    OF   INTERESTS. 


23 


in  1842,  it  fell  to  a  lower  point  than  had  been  known  for  twenty  years,  the 
consequence  of  which  was,  a  great  diminution  in  the  immigration  of  the  two 
succeeding  years.     Thence  to  1847,  the  increase  was  very  rapid  j  but.  in  the 
following  year,  it  became  stationary,  and  is  now  falling  rapidly. 
We  may  now  proceed  to  the  next  great  article  of  food — 

suoka. 


1821  to  1829   . 
1830   

Foreign. 
57,000,000 
.  '96,000,000 

Crop  of 
Louisiana. 

45,000,000 
48,000,000 
75,000,000 
75,000,000 
70,000,000 
75,000,000 

77,000,000 
115,000,000 

105,000,000 
200,000,000 
186,000,000 
146,000,000 
240,000,000 
220,000,000 

Total.    Per  head 
102,000,000     9 
144,000,000    11 
144,000,000    10$ 
123,000,000     9 
167,000,000    12 
190,000,000    13 
187,000,000    11$ 
229,000,000    12$ 
287,000,000    15 
314,000,000    16 
294,000,000    14$ 
372,000,000    18 
484,000,000    23 
467,000,000    21$ 

1831  
1832   
1833  

69,000,000 
.  48,000,000 
97,000,000 

1834   

.  115,000,000 

1835  to  1841,  138,000,000—  -J. 
1342  and  1843 

1844  . 
1845   

.   110,000,000 
.  114,000,000 

.   182,000,000 
.  114,000,000 

1846  
1847   

.   108,000,000 
.  232,000,000 

1848  

244,000,000 

1849   . 

.  242,000,000 

We  see  here  a  rapid  increase  of  consumption  from  1829  to  1834,  and  that 
it  then  diminished  in  actual  amount  until  1844,  and  that  the  average  of 
1846-7  and  1847-8  was  but  little  less  than  double  that  of  1842-3.  The  power 
to  consume  foreign  sugar  has  kept  steady  pace  with  the  increase  in  the  home 
supply,  giving  a  total  consumption  for  the  year  1847—8  exceeding,  by  more 
than  150  per  cent.,  that  of  the  period  from  1821  to  1829,  and  almost  double 
that  of  1842  and  1843. 

The  power  of  producing  food  thus  kept  pace  with  the  power  to  apply 
labour  and  capital  to  the  conversion  of  food  and  other  raw  materials  into 
iron,  cloth,  and  other  commodities  requisite  for  the  use  of  man ;  and 
thus  both  kept  pace  with  the  tendency  to  the  concentration  of  population. 
With  every  increase  in  the  power  of  production,  consumption  grew,  and  the 
labourer  received  larger  returns  for  his  labour,  producing  a  tendency  to 
immigration.  With  every  diminution  in  the  power  of  production,  the  power 
to  pay  for  foreign  commodities  diminished,  and  hence  it  was  that  the  early 
years  of  the  approach  to  freedom  of  trade  were  signalized  by  the  creation  of 
a  vast  debt,  the  interest  on  which  has  now  to  be  paid. 

INTERNAL  COMMERCE. 

We  may  now  examine  how  far  the  power  to  maintain  internal  trade  waxed 
or  waned  with  the  increased  or  diminished  power  of  production,  for  which 
purpose,  I  give  the  TOLLS  on  the  three  principal  routes  between  the  east  and 
west,  and  the  TONNAGE  that  passed  through  the  Louisville  and  Portland  Canal. 
In  examining  them  it  will  be  proper  to  bear  in  mind  that  the  receipts  from 
immigrants  from  Europe,  in  the  last  two  years,  have  been  prodigious,  not- 
withstanding which  there  has  been  a  large  decrease  in  the  two  from  which  I 
have  been  able  to  obtain  complete  returns.  It  follows,  of 'course,  that  the 
receipts  from  merchandise  have  greatly  diminished  in  their  ratio  to  popula- 
tion. Should  immigration  continue  to  fall  off,  the  deficiency  in  the  receipts 
from  these  works  will  become  of  serious  importance  to  the  treasuries  of  both 
New  York  and  Pennsylvania. 


24 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 


TOLLS. 

Baltimore 

Ton'ge, 

New  Totk 

Per  1000  of 

and  Ohio 

Per  1000  of 

Penn. 

P.  1000  of 

L.  &P. 

Canal. 

population. 

Railroad. 

population. 

Canals. 

population. 

Canal 

1826, 

$844,000 

$78 

1827, 

880,000 

74 

1828, 

829,000 

68 

1829, 

815,000 

65 

1830, 

1,042,000 

81 

1831, 

748,000 

66 

$31,000 

76,00( 

1832, 

1,112,000 

81 

137,000 

9-9 

70,001 

1888, 

1,888,000 

98 

196,000 

13-9 

148,000 

10-5 

170,001 

1884, 

1,381,000 

95 

205,000 

14-1 

806,000 

21-1 

162,001 

1835, 

1,482,000 

99 

263,000 

17-6 

679,000 

45-4 

200,  00< 

1836-41 

1,656,000 

102 

849,000 

21-5 

1,020,000 

60-7 

223,001 

1842, 

1,749,000 

97 

426,000 

23-6 

903,000 

50-0 

172,001 

1848, 

2,081,000 

112 

575,000 

81-0 

1,014,000 

65-0 

232,  00< 

1844, 

2,446,000 

128 

658,000 

34-6 

1,164.000 

61-5 

304,  OOl 

1845, 

2,646,000 

135 

718,000 

87-7 

1,154,000 

59-1 

318,001 

1846, 

2,756,000 

138 

881,000 

44-0 

1,357,000 

68-0 

341,001 

1847, 

3,635,000 

177 

1,101,000 

54-0 

1,587,000 

78 

307,001 

1848, 

3,252,000 

155 

1,213,000 

60-0 

1,550,000 

73-3 

341,00 

1849, 

3,266,000 

150 

1,241,000 

57-2 

1,580,000 

72-4 

The  LAKE  TONNAGE  in  1834  was 
In  1841  it  had  risen  to  only    . 
1846  it  was  . 
1847, 
1848,   .        .        . 


28,521  tons. 

56,252 
106,836 
139,399 
166,400 


We  thus  see  while  it  increased  but  28,000  tons  in  the  first  period  of  seven 
years,  it  has  gained  110,000  in  the  last,  and  nearly  all  of  this  since  1843. 
At  the  present  time  there  is  no  tendency  to  increase.  The  great  support  of 
this  trade  is  found  in  the  transport  of  immigrants,  and  any  diminution  therein 
must  be  followed  by  a  diminution  in  the  tonnage. 

In  1842,  the  STEAMBOAT  TONNAGE  on  the  western  rivers  was  but  126,278, 
and  the  tendency  was  downward,  as  the  business  was  very  small,  as  may  be 
seen  from  the  number  of  trips  made  by  certain  boats : — 


1839, 
1840, 


Boats. 
35 
28 


Trips. 
141 
147 


1841, 
1842, 


Boats. 
32 
29 


Trips. 

.    162 

88 


In  1846,  only  four  years  afterwards,  it  had  almost  doubled,  the  amount 
being  249,055.  In  the  two  succeeding  years  it  increased  rapidly,  as  may  be 
seen  by  the  following  statement  of  boats  built  at  Cincinnati : — 

1845-6,        6657  tons.  |  1846-7,        8268  tons.  |  1847-8,        10,232  tons. 

In  the  last  year  the  tendency  has  been  downward;  the  boats  built  being 
only  7281  tons;  and  the  number  of  arrivals  being  only  3239,  against  4007 
in  the  previous  year. 

We  thus  meet  everywhere  the  same  results.  From  1835  to  1843,  scarcely 
any  increase ;  but  from  that  date  every  thing  starts  into  life  and  grows  with 
rapidity.  Arrived  at  1848  and  1849,  all  tends  downwards,  notwithstanding 
the  great  increase  of  population. 

TRADE   OP  NEW   ORLEANS. 

The  value  of  the  principal  products  of  the  interior  received  at  New  Orleans, 
from  1841-2,  to  the  present  time,  has  been  as  follows: — 


THE    HARMONY    OF   INTERESTS.  25 


Total. 

TotaL 

1841-2, 
1842-3, 

.  $45,716,045 
53,782,084 

1845-6, 
1846-7, 

.  J77.193.464 
90,033,000 

1843-4, 
1844-5, 

.  60,094,716 
57,166,122 

1847-8, 
1848-9, 

.  70,779,000 
81,889,000 

The  value  doubled  in  six  years,  but  it  is  now  falling,  notwithstanding  the 
large  increase  of  western  population  in  the  last  two  years. 

NEW  YORK 

Being  the  place  supposed  to  be  most  benefited  by  perfect  freedom  of  trade, 
we  may  profit  by  an  examination  into  the  effect  of  the  various  systems,  as 
exhibited  in  the  number  of  houses  built  in  that  city,  as  compared  with  the 
population  of  the  country,  of  which  it  is  the  commercial  capital.  The  ear- 
liest account  I  have  been  able  to  obtain  is  that  of  1834 : — 

Per  million  of  Per  million  of 

Houses  built.  population.  Houses  built          population. 


1884,        .        .  .877  .        .60 

1885-41,  average,  948*  .         58 

1842,        .  912  .        .    60 

1848,   .        .        .  1278  .  .         69 

1844,        .        .  1210  .        .     64 


1845,  .        ,        1980  .        .  101 

1846,  .        .   1910  .         .        95 

1847,  .        .        1828  .        .    90 

1848,  .        .  1191  .         .        60 

1849,  1496  68 


The  rapid  extension  of  Brooklyn  has  been  since  1842.  Had  it  been 
possible  to  obtain  a  similar  account  of  that  city,  which  is  but  a  suburb  of 
New  York,  the  difference  would  have  been  much  more  striking.  "We  have 
here,  however,  all  that  is  needed  to  show  that  houses  in  New  York  grew  with 
the  growth  of  factories  and  furnaces,  and  diminished,  as  they  now  diminish, 
with  the  cessation  of  their  operations. 

PHILADELPHIA. 

It  is  deemed  desirable  to  give  the  movement  of  PHILADELPHIA  as  the 
distributor  of  a  large  portion  of  the  coal  and  iron  of  the  Union,  and  as  the 
centre  of  an  important  portion  of  the  commerce  between  the  East  and  the 
West ;  but  it  is  impossible  to  obtain  the  number  of  houses  built,  because  of 
no  such  record  having  been  preserved,  by  several  of  the  districts,  until  quite 
recently,  and  to  give  the  movement  of  the  population  in  the  several  periods, 
it  is  necessary  to  take  the  returns  under  the  State  censuses,  which  are  septen- 
nial, and  those  made  under  the  authority  of  the  federal  government,  which 
are  deceniiial.  The  former  returns  give  only  the  number  of  taxables,  but  by 
multiplying  them  by  five  the  population  was  always  found  to  be  nearly  ob- 
tained, and  I  have  done  so  throughout,  although  it  is  said  that  the  proportion 
of  non-taxables  has  within  a  few  years  so  far  increased  as  to  make  it  neces- 
sary  to  multiply  by  five  and  a  half.  How  far  that  is  the  case  will  be  deter- 
mined by  the  census  of  next  year. 

Ratio  to  population 
of  the  Union,  in 
Per  cent,     thousands  to  mil- 
Taxables.  Population.          per  annum,  lions. 

1821.  State  census  .        .        27,892        .  139,460        .  .15-3 

1828.             «  .        .        37,313        .  186,565  increase  4-9  .  15-2 

1830.  U.  S.  « 188,958        «        -6  .  14-6 

1835.  State  «  .        .        49,847        .  249,235        «      6'6  .  16-7 

1840.  U.  S.  « 258,000        «        -8  .  15-1 

1842.  State  «  .         .         51,063         .  255,315  decrease  -5  .  14-1 

'849.       «  «                          77,285        .  386,425  increase  7-4  .  17'7 

•  Of  these  the  number  built  in  1835  and  1836,  before  the  Compromise  I  egan  to  bav» 
much  effect,  was  greater  than  in  any  three  of  the  other  years. 


26  THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 

It  appears  obvious  that  the  productive  power  of  the  country  diminished 
from  1835  to  1841,  and  still  more  rapidly  in  the  two  following  years;  and 
therefore  it  was  that  the  power  to  pay  for  foreign  commodities  diminished  so 
much  that  consumption  could  be  maintained  only  by  obtaining  goods  on 
credit,  to  be  paid  for  at  some  future  time,  and  bearing  interest  until  paid. 
The  following  table  will  show  the  VALUE  OF  EXPORTS,  being  the  amount  of 
merchandise  received  from  abroad  in  payment  for  merchandise  and  freights. 

Debt  paid  off. 


Value  of  exports,  per  head.       Debt  contracted. 

1821,  to  1829,    aver., 

$5 

• 

1830,     .        .         '. 

4-32 

. 

1831, 

6-10    . 

. 

1832,     . 

6-61 

. 

1833! 

6-20    . 

. 

1834,     . 

7-08 

. 

1835  to  1841,     aver., 

6-02    . 

.      $170,000,000 

1842-3,     . 

4-48 

Interest  unpaid. 

1844,    . 

5-03    . 

. 

1845, 

6-16 

. 

1846,     . 

5-75    . 

. 

1847, 

7 

. 

1848,     . 

5-88    . 

8,000,000 

1849, 

6-19 

.      22,000,000 

Interest. 

$5,000,000 
5,000,000 


With  each  step  in  the  diminution  of  the  power  to  produce,  there  is  dimi- 
nished power  of  purchase,  and  hence  the  necessity  for  obtaining  goods  on 
credit.  So  it  was  from  1835  to  1841,  and  the  result  was  almost  universal 
bankruptcy.  So  is  it  at  present,  and  the  goal  towards  which  we  are  moving 
would  seem  to  be  the  same.  The  amount  now  required  for  the  payment  of 
interest  is  about  814,000,000  per  annum,  being  $2,000,000  more  than  was 
required  for  the  same  purpose  two  years  since. 

In  the  following  table  are  given  two  species  of  articles,  of  one  of  which 
(flax)  a  large  part  was  freed  from  duty  by  the  Compromise  tariff,  and  so  con- 
tinued until  September,  1841,  while  the  other  was  subject  to  the  same  pro- 
visions as  manufactures  of  other  kinds.  It  will  be  seen  how  small  is  the 
difference  of  movement,  proving  that  the  amount  of  importation  depends 
upon  the  power  to  import,  and  is  but  slightly  affected  by  the  question  of  duty. 


Manufactures 

Per 

China  and 

Per 

of  flax. 

head. 

earthenware. 

head. 

Sept.  30,  1821-29, 

average,       .     $3,333,000 

29 

$1,160,000 

10 

"    1830,      . 

3,011,000 

23* 

1,259,000 

10 

"    1831, 

.     3,790,000 

28* 

.     1,624,000 

12* 

"    1832,      . 

4,073,000 

30 

2,024,000 

15 

«    1833, 

.     8,132,000 

22 

.     1,818,000 

13 

"    1834,      . 

5,485,000 

38 

1,591,000 

11 

"    1835-41,5 

56,350,000—  J  =5,080,000 

,31 

1,950,000—  I  =1,560,000 

9* 

Ju 

"    1842  to  \ 
e  30,  1843,     / 

average,           2,900,000 

15* 

.     1,300,000 

7 

"    1844, 

.     4,492,000 

23* 

1,632,000 

8* 

"    1845, 

4,923,000 

25 

.     2,166,000 

11 

"    1846, 

.     4,972,000 

25 

2,201,000 

11* 

"    1847,      . 

5,152,000 

25 

.     2,320,000 

11 

"    1848,      j 
"    1849, 

56,600,000—  \  =5,660,000 
6,700,000—  £=4,750,000 

27 
22 

2,600,0V)—  1=2,228,000 
2,231,000—^=1,860,000 

10 

•  In  1 829,  the  debt  of  the  Federal  Government  was  $58,000,000.  In  the  year  1 833-4, 
it  was  reduced  to  $4.000,000,  and  in  the  following  year  to  $37,000.  As  much  of  this  was 
hflld  abroad,  the  amount  paid  off  in  this  period  was  probably  equal  to  that  of  States  ttnd 
corporations  transmitted  abroad  at  the  same  time. 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  27 


We  see  here  the  importation  of  linens  increasing  under  the  tariff  of  1828, 
diminishing  from  1835  to  1841,  and  still  further  diminishing  in  the  closing 
years  of  the  Compromise  tariff.  Thenceforward  it  rises  rapidly,  notwith- 
standing the  inci  easing  tendency  to  substitute  manufactures  of  cotton  for 
those  of  flax. 

In  regard  to  China  and  earthenware,  we  see  the  same  course  of  events. 
The  importation  rises  under  the  tariff  of  1828,  diminishes  under  the  Com- 
promise, and  still  further  diminishes  in  1842—3,  when  it  begins  to  rise  under 
the  tariff  of  1842,  but  never  attains  the  same  height  as  in  the  previous  period. 

FRENCH   MERCHANDISE. 

Per  head. 

1822  to  1829,  average,  .        .        .        .      9,130,000  81  Silks  subject  to  duty. 

1830, 8,240,000  64  " 

1831, 14,737,000  1-11  " 

1832,  ......         12,754,000  92 

1833,  ...  ...     13,962,000  1-00          Silks  free. 

1834,  ...  .  17,557,000  1-21 

1835  to  1841,  average  25,200,000  —  },      20,160,000  1-24  " 

1842  and  1843,  average,        .        .         j     14,500,000  80   Duties  reimposed. 

1844, 17,952,000  94  " 

1845, 22,069,000  1-13 

1846,  ......        21,600,000  1-08  " 

1847,  .        .  ' 24,900,000  1-21  " 

1848,  .        .        .  28,000,000  —  4,     24,000,000  1-14  " 

1849,  23,233,000  —  1-,      19,360,000  90 

We  have  here  the  same  results  as  elsewhere.  The  commodities  we  receive 
from  France  are  almost  altogether  articles  of  luxury.  In  the  period  between 
1829  atd  1834,  there  is  a  gradual  increase,  until,  in  1834,  the  consumption 
exceeds  by  fifty  per  cent,  the  average  from  1821  to  1829.  Thenceforward 
the  amount  remains  almost  precisely  the  same  until  we  reach  1841.  In  the 
period  ending  June  30,  1843,  it  falls  to  the  level  of  fifteen  years  before. 
In  the  following  year,  it  begins  to  rise,  and,  by  1847,  attains  the  level  of 
1834.  In  1848  it  falls  to  Sl-14.  In  1849,  the  amount,  paid  for,  falls 
almost  to  the  level  of  1842-3. 

The  remarkable  part  of  this  table  is,  the  small  increase  produced  by  the 
abolition  of  duty  upon  silks,  and  the  fact  that  the  import  rapidly  increased 
after  the  duties  had  been  reimposed. 

TEA   AND   COFFEE. 

The  following  table  represents  the  quantities  of  tea  and  coffee  retained  for 
consumption  rather  than  the  actual  consumption  of  the  respective  years,  and 
the  great  irregularity  of  amount  is  more  apparent  than  real.  It  is  here 
shown,  that  the  average  consumption  of  tea  in  the  years  1833  and  1834, 
the  last  two  years  in  which  the  tariff  of  1828  was  in  activity,  was  greater 
than  that  of  the  ensuing  ten  years,  and  that,  notwithstanding  the  great 
increase  of  population,  it  did  not  rise  above  that  quantity  until  1845.  Of 
coffee  the  consumption  per  head  was  little  greater  from  1835  to  1841  than 
the  average  of  1833-34. 


28 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 


Tea.     • 

Per  head.                                         Coffee.    Per  head. 

1821  to  1829,  average,  pounds,  6,000,000 

•53 

pounds,  24,000,000 

2 

13 

1880     . 

.       6,800,000 

•58 

38,300,000 

3 

00 

1881, 

4,600,000 

•85 

75,000,000 

5 

60 

1882,   . 

.      8,600,000 

•68 

86,000,000 

2 

60 

1883,        .        .    (Duty  free,)  12,900,000 

•91 

(Duty  free,)  75,000,000 

6 

30 

1884,    . 

13,100,000 

90 

44,000,000 

3 

00 

1835  to  1841,  12,600 

000  —  £,  10,080,000 

•62 

89,000,000—  J,  71,200,000 

4 

40 

1842-1843, 

«                13,000,000 

•71 

107,000,000 

5 

60 

1844, 

«                13,000,000 

•68 

149,000,000 

7 

85 

1845, 

«                17,100,000 

•88 

94,000,000 

4-82 

1846, 

'                16,800,000 

•84 

124,000,000 

6 

20 

1847, 

«                14,200,000 

•70 

152,000,000 

7 

25 

1848,                         "               21,000,000 

1-00 

145,000,000 

6-90 

1849                          "               18,213,000 

•61 

151,000,000 

7 

•00 

The  great  question  to  be  settled  is — "  Which  is  the  system  under  which 
the  labourer  is  enabled  to  obtain  the  largest  quantity  of  food,  fuel,  clothing, 
machinery  of  production  and  transportation — protection  or  free  trade?" 
The  former  is  denounced  as  a  "  war  upon  labour  and  capital,"  and  yet  it 
seems  clear  that  the  power  to  consume  all  those  things  for  which  men  are 
willing  to  labour,  and  in  the  production  of  which  other  men  are  willing  to 
invest  capital,  was  greater  under  the  two  protective  tariffs  than  at  any  other 
period,  and  that  it  is  now  gradually,  but  certainly,  diminishing.  Wages  are 
falling,  and  the  result  is,  a  diminution  of  immigration,  and  an  increasing 
tendency  to  emigration,  both  accompanied  by  a  decrease  of  productive  power, 
to  be  followed  by  a  father  decline  of  wages,  and  a  further  increase  of 
emigration.  Shipping  has  grown  with  immigration,  and  freights  have  fallen, 
but,  with  diminution  in  the  former,  the  latter  must  rise,  and  many  of  the 
commodities  that  we  have  recently  exported  will  have  to  remain  at  home, 
aud  thus  there  will  be  a  diminished  power  of  importation,  accompanied  by 
a  diminution  of  the  public  revenue,  the  improvement  of  which  was  one  of 
the  objects  proposed  in  the  adoption  of  the  policy  of  1846.  How  the 
different  systems  have  thus  far  operated  upon  the  receipts  from  import  duties 
will  be  seen  by  an  examination  of  the  following  table. 


CUSTOMS   REVENUE, 


Derived  from  the  import  of  Merchandise  paid  for  with  our  Exports. 

$17,170,000 


1821  to  1829,  average, 

1830  to  1834 

1835  to  1841,  average, 

Less  one-fifth,  for  goods  bought  in  ex- 
change for  certificates  of  debt, 


18,500,000 
24,000,000 


Per  head. 
1-69 
1-75 


1842  and  1843, 
1843-4,  . 
1844-6, 
1845-6,  . 


Add  duty  on  $5,000,000  of  debts  re- 
deemed,        .... 


3,404,300 


26,712,000 
1,500,000 


1846-7,        .  .  .  .  23,747,000 

Add  duty  on  $5,000,000  of  debts  re- 
deemed,        ....       1,500,000 


1847-8, 81,757,000 

Deduct  duty  on  the  amount  of  debt 
created,  say  $8,000.000, 


1848-9, 


Debt  created,  $22,000,000— duty, 


2,400,000 

28,346,000 
6,600,000 


13,736,000 
16,400,000 
26,183,000 
27,528,000 


28,212,000 
25,247,000 

29,357,000 
21,746,000 


0-841 
0-90 
1-38 
1-41 


1-41 
1-23 

1-40 
1-00 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  29 

It  is  here  seen,  that  the  importation  of  duty-paying  articles  increased  so 
much  under  the  tariff  of  1828,  that  the  revenue  per  head  was  greater  than 
in  the  previous  period,  although  the  duty  on  railroad  iron  and  on  tea  and 
coffee  was  abolished  in  1832.  The  case  would,  however,  appear  much 
stronger  were  allowance  made  for  the  movements  of  specie.  The  period 
from  1821  to  1829  was  one  of  great  exhaustion,  and  the  exports  of 
specie  exceeded  the  imports  by  an  average  of  almost  one  million  a  year ; 
whereas,  the  imports  of  the  following  period  exceeded  the  exports  by  an 
average  of  five  millions  a  year.  The  total  difference  is  therefore  six  millions 
a  year.  Had  this  been  imported,  as  in  the  previous  period,  in  the  form  of 
duty-paying  articles,  and  had  the  duties  on  tea  and  coffee  been  retained,  the 
revenue  would  have  exceeded  two  dollars  per  head. 

With  the  next  period,  we  find  a  great  decrease  in  the  revenue,  indicating 
a  diminished  power  to  pay  for  foreign  merchandise,  resulting  from  dimin- 
ished productiveness  in  the  application  of  labour  at  home. 

"With  1842-3,  there  is  a  trifling  increase,  resulting  from  the  action  of  the 
tariff  of  1842,  which  was  in  operation  during  the  last  nine  months  of  this 
short  period. 

From  June,  1843,  to  June,  1846,  the  amount  rises  to  an  average  of 
$1-40,  and  maintains  itself  during  the  first  three  years  of  the  period.  The 
passage  of  the  act  of  August,  1846,  connected  with  the  warehousing  system, 
tended  to  reduce  the  amount  received  into  the  treasury  in  the  last  year  of 
this  period. 

With  1848,  we  find  the  average  maintained,  without,  however,  the  increase 
that  might  naturally  have  been  looked  for  in  consequence  of  the  great 
demand  for  breadstuff's,  consequent  upon  the  failure  of  the  potato-crop  in 
Ireland. 

In  the  last  year  (1848-9),  being  the  second  in  which  the  tariff  of  1846 
was  in  action,  the  amount  of  revenue  derived  from  merchandise  paid  for  by 
our  exports  has  greatly  declined. 

In  comparing  the  receipts  under  the  tariff  of  1842  with  those  of  that  of 
1828,  it  is  necessary  to  bear  in  mind,  that,  in  the  latter  period,  before  mer- 
chandise could  be  purchased,  there  was  a  sum  of  ten  millions  of  dollars  to 
be  provided  for  payment  of  interest  on  the  debt  incurred  in  the  free  trade  one. 
At  thirty  per  cent.,  that  would  have  given  three  millions  of  dollars,  or  about 
fifteen  cents  per  head. 

The  total  amount  of  interest  now  to  be  paid  is  about  fourteen  millions  of 
dollars,  and  this  claim  must  be  discharged  by  our  exports  before  merchandise 
can  be  purchased  :  the  consequence  of  which  must  be,  a  great  deficiency  in 
future  revenue. 

With  these  facts  before  us,  we  may  now  examine  the  different  revenue 
systems  that  have  been  presented  for  consideration  and  adoption.  By  the 
English  school  it  is  held  that,  as  cultivation  first  commences  on  the 
richest  soils,  agricultural  labour  is  then  largely  paid,  and  the  diversion  of 
any  portion  of  the  population  to  mechanical  pursuits  is  attended  with  loss. 
Observation,  however,  shows  that  the  first  cultivator  commences,  invariably, 
on  the  poorer  soils,  and  that  the  rich  lands  of  river  bottoms,  the  underlying 
beds  of  marl,  limestone,  &c.,  are  only  brought  into  cultivation  at  a  later 
period.  The  English  school  holds  that  mechanical  labour  must  necessarily, 
because  of  the  abundance  of  fertile  land  and  consequent  profitable  appli- 
cation of  labour,  be  dearer  in  a  new  than  in  an  old  country,  and  that 
competition  can  be  maintained  only  by  aid  of  laws  restricting  importation. 
It  holds  that  double  loss  results  from  such  restriction,  labour  being  with- 
drawn from  the  profitable  pursuit  of  agriculture  to  be  given  to  the  com- 
paratively unprofitable  one  of  converting  agricultural  products  into  the 


30  THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 

various  commodities  required  for  the  use  of  man :  also,  that  these  per- 
sons, thus  unprofitably  employed,  are  maintained  out  of  taxes  imposed 
upon  the  consumers  of  their  commodities,  and  that  every  dollar  paid  to  the 
government  on  the  import  of  articles,  in  part  manufactured  at  home,  is 
accompanied  by  the  payment  of  five,  ten,  fifteen,  or  twenty  dollars  paid  to  a 
selected  class,  thus  living  by  taxation  imposed  on  their  neighbours  for  their 
support.  This  idea  may  be  found  fully  carried  out  in  a  report  of  the  late 
Secretary  of  the  Treasury,  for  1846.  It  is  there  shown,  that  all  the  coal 
consumed  in  the  Union  costs  the  consumer  §1-60  more  than  it  would  do 
under  a  system  of  free  trade,  although  the  average  price  of  all  the  coal  sold 
at  Pittsburgh,  Wilkesbarre,  Mauch  Chunk  and  Pottsville  did  not,  at  that 
moment,  exceed  $1-50. 

To  relieve  the  consumer  from  this  double  taxation,  the  English  school 
holds  that  all  duties  for  revenue  should  be  imposed  upon  articles  t'liat  cannot 
be  produced  in  the  country,  such  as  tea,  coffee,  &c.,  and  that  all  those  that 
can  be  produced  in  it,  should  be  admitted  free.  Such  is  the  theory  that 
dictated  the  tariff  of  1846,  and  the  subsequent  efforts  to  amend  it  by  the 
imposition  of  a  duty  on  tea  and  coffee. 

The  other  school  holds  that  articles  which  can  be  produced  at  home  should 
be  protected,  while  those  which  cannot  should  be  admitted  free  of  all  duty, 
and  such  was  the  view  which  prompted  the  abolition  of  all  duties  on  tea 
and  coffee,  by  the  act  of  1832. 

By  the  working  of  the  two  systems,  their  value  is  to  be  judged.  In  the 
first  eighteen  months  of  the  tariff  of  1832,  tea  and  coffee  were  admitted  free 
of  duty,  with  a  loss  to  the  revenue  of  nearly  three  and  a  half  millions  of 
dollars  per  annum,  to  which  was  to  be  added  a  great  loss  of  duty  on  silks, 
also  free;  but  the  protection  of  manufactures  generally  was  maintained,  and 
the  consumption  of  foreign  merchandise  liable  to  duty  continued  so  great, 
that  the  revenue  increased  more  rapidly  than  the  population.  In  the 
succeeding  period,  protection  gradually  diminished,  with  a  certainty  of  its 
total  disappearance  as  the  Compromise  bill  should  come  fully  into  action,  and 
the  productiveness  of  labour  became  so  far  diminished,  that  the  payment 
into  the  Treasury  for  duties  on  foreign  merchandise  fell  to  an  average  of 
less  than  one-half  of  what  it  had  been  from  1829  to  1834. 

With  the  tariff  of  1842,  it  rose  gradually,  and  with  a  steady  upward 
tendency ;  while,  as  that  of  1846  comes  into  operation,  there  is  a  movement 
directly  the  reverse. 

PUBLIC  EXPENDITURE. 

When  men  live  in  connection  with  each  other,  they  are  enabled  to  protect 
themselves,  and  have  little  need  of  fleets  or  armies  for  their  protection.  A 
few  officers  can  then  peXbrm  the  duties  incident  to  the  maintenance  of 
government.  They  then  exercise,  in  a  high  degree,  the  power  of  self- 
government. 

When  they  are  widely  separated  from  each  other,  they  are  unable  tc 
protect  themselves,  and  have  need  of  fleets  and  armies  for  their  protection. 
Many  officers  are  then  required  for  the  performance  of  the  duties  of  govern- 
ment, and  the  power  of  self-government  is  diminished. 

With  the  increase  of  fleets  and  armies,  and  of  government  officials,  the  cost 
of  government  is  increased. 

The  policy  of  1828,  and  that  of  1842,  tended,  as  we  have  seen,  to  concen- 
tration of  population  and  combination  of  exertion,  and,  therefore,  to  increase 
in  the  power  of  self-government.  That  of  1833  tended,  and  that  of  1846 
tends,  as  has  been  seen,  to  dispersion  of  population  and  diminution  in  the 
power  of  combination,  and,  consequently,  to  diminution  in  the  power  of  self- 


THE    HARMONY  OF    INTERESTS.  31 

government.  What  has  been  the  effect  of  the  two  systems  on  the  public 
expenditure  I  propose  now  to  show.  The  true  "  war  upon  labour  and 
capital,"  is  that  which  increases  the  cost  of  government,  and  thus  diminishes 
the  power  to  accumulate  capital,  to  be  used  in  aid  of  labour.  Every  step 
towards  diminution  in  the  expenditure  for  that  purpose  tends  to  raise  wages; 
and  every  one  tending  towards  its  increase,  tends  equally  towards  diminution 
in  the  power  of  both  labourer  and  capitalist  to  command  the  necessaries, 
conveniences,  or  luxuries  of  life. 

From  1821  to  1829,  the  total  expenditure  of  the  government, 
exclusive  of  payments  on  account  of  debts  previously  existing, 
was  $117,000,000,  being  an  average  of  ....  $13,000,000 

From  October,  1829,  to  October,  1834,  the  period  of  the 
tariff  of  1828,  the  total  expenditure,  exclusive  of  such  pay- 
ments, was  84,000,000,  being  an  average  of  .  .  .  .  16,800,000 

From  October,  1834,  to  October,  1841,  the  period  of  the 
Compromise,  during  which  we  colonized  Texas  and  Oregon,  the 
total  expenditure  was  8223,000,000.  In  this  period  there  were 
no  payments  on  account  of  the  old  debt,  the  whole  having  been 
extinguished  at  the  close  of  1834.  The  average  of  this  period 
of  dispersion  was 31,700,000 

From  October,  1841,  to  June  30,  1843,  was  a  period  of 
exhaustion,  and  the  wants  of  the  government  were  such  as 
precluded  expenditure.  The  average  was  ....  20,400,000 

That  of  1843-4  was 20,600,000 

That  of  1844-5, 21,400,000 

With  1845-6,  we  recommence  the  system  of  dispersion. 
The  occupation  of  Texas  had  brought  with  it  war  with  Mexico, 
and  the  expenditure  rose  to  .  .  .  .  26,800,000 

In  1846-7,  dispersion  increased,  and  large  armies  were  sent 
to  Mexico  for  the  purpose  of  compelling  the  cession  of  Cali- 
fornia, the  consequence  of  which  was  that  the  expenditure  rose 
to  59,400,000 

In  1847-8,  it  was    . 45,000,000 

And  a  large  amount  remained  unsettled. 

In  1848-9, 46,798,000 

As  a  necessary  consequence  of  this  system,  the  public  debt,  which  was 
extinguished  under  the  system  of  concentration,  grew  rapidly  under  that  of 
dispersion,  to  be  again  diminished  under  that  of  concentration,  and  now  again 
increased  under  that  of  dispersion. 

PUBLIC   DEBT. 

1821,  $89,987,428 

1829,  68,421,414  Decrease  in  eight  years,  $31,566,014 

1834,  4,760,082                "           five  years,  53,661,332 

1834-5,  37,733  Extinguished. 

1841,  6,737,398  Increase  in  five  years,  6,737,398 

June  30,  1843,        26,898,958                "           two  years,  20,161,560 

"  1845,        17,093,794  Decrease  in  two  years,  9,805,164 

"  1848,        48,526,379  Increase  in  three  years,  31,433,585 

"  1849,        64,704,693                 "          one  year,  16,178,314 

CREDIT. 

With  every  step  in  the  diminution  of  debt,  credit  grows ;  with  every  one 
in  the  increase  thereof,  credit  diminishes. 

The  policy  of  1828  increased  production  and  raised  wages.     The  power  to 


32 


THE    HARMONY   OF    INTERESTS. 


pay  for  foreign  commodities  was  great,  and  the  revenue  was  large,  the  conse- 
quence of  which  was  the  extinction  of  the  public  debt,  at  the  close  of  1834. 
Credit  was  therefore  high. 

The  policy  of  1 882-8  diminished  production  and  lowered  wages.  Credit 
was  high,  and  we  obtained  cloth  and  iron  in  exchange  for  certificates  of  debt; 
the  consequence  of  which  was,  that,  ^at  the  close  of  1841,  the  foreign  debt 
was  two  hundred  millions,  much  of  the  interest  of  which  we  were  unable  to  pay. 

Under  the  Revenue  tariff  of  1841-2,  public  and  private  revenue  almost 
disappeared,  and  bankruptcy  and  repudiation  were  the  necessary  consequence. 

Under  the  tariff  of  1842,  production  increased  and  wages  rose.  "The 
power  to  pay  for  foreign  commodities  increased,  public  and  private  revenue 
grew,  and  we  commenced  to  diminish  our  debt,  the  consequence  of  which 
was  the  perfect  re-establishment  of  credit. 

Under  the, tariff  of  1846,  production  diminishes  and  wages  have  fallen. 
The  power  to  pay  for  foreign  commodities  is  diminishing,  and  we  are  again 
buying  cloth  and  iron,  and  settling  for  them  with  certificates  of  debt,  the 
amount  of  which  transmitted  to  Europe  in  the  two  years  ending  June  30, 
1849,  is  estimated  at  thirty  millions  of  dollars;  all  of  which  we  have,  in 
that  time  eaten  and  drunk,  and  used,  but  have  yet  to  pay  for. 

With  a  view  to  present  at  a  glance  the  results  obtained  by  this  examina- 
tion of  the  policy  of  the  Union,  I  give  the  following  diagrams,  in  which  the 
movement  under  the  various  systems  is  distinctly  shown. 

No.  I.  gives  the  nine  years  from  1821  to  1829,  when  the  tariff  of  1828 
came  into  operation. 

No.  II.— The  years  of  the  protective  tariff  of  1828,  from  1829  to  1834. 

No.  III.— Those  of  the  Compromise  tariff,  from  1834  to  1841.  In  this 
case,  it  will  be  observed  that  I  have  in  all  cases  deducted  from  the  con- 
sumption of  imported  commodities  one-fifth,  that  being  the  quantity  obtained 
in  exchange  for  certificates  of  debt. 

No.  IV. — This  represents  the  movement  under  the  strictly  revenue  clauses 
of  the  Compromise  tariff.  In  some  cases,  as  will  be  seen,  one  year,  and  in 
others  two  years  are  included  in  this  period.  The  returns  for  coal,  railroad 
and  canal  tolls,,  &c.,  are  made  from  the  civil  year,  whereas  those  connected 
with  commerce  are  made  for  the  fiscal  year  ending  June  30.  The  effect  of 
taking  one  year,  is  to  throw  into  No.  III.,  the  period  of  the  Compromise,  one- 
half  portion  of  this  period,  and.  the  other  portion  into  No.  V.,  the  period  of 
the  tariff  of  1842. 

No.  V.— The  tariff  of  1842. 

No.  VI.— That  of  1846. 

In  the  diagrams  representing  the  movements  of  iron,  coal,  cottons  and 
woollens,  the  consumption  is  given  in  .two  sets  of  lines;  one  representing  the 
domestic  products  consumed,  and  the  other  the  total  quantity.  An  examina- 
tion of  them  will  show,  that  the  amount  of  consumption  is  dependent  upon 
that  of  domestic  production,  and  that  any  deficiency  therein  is  never  compen- 
sated by  increase  of  importation,  as  it  should  be,  if  the  theory  were  true  upon 
which  the  tariff  of  1846  is  based. 


n. 


in. 


IV.     V. 


CONSUMPTION  OF  IRON,  FOREIGN  I00) 
AND  DOMESTIC,  in  pounds  per 
head  of  the  population.    (See 
page  11.) 


Railroad  iron  was  exempted  from  duty  in  the  third  year  of  the  second  period,  and  from 
that  time  consumption  ceased  to  increase. 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 


33 


CONSUMPTION  OF  COAL,  FOREIGN 
AND  DOMESTIC,  in  tons  per 
thousand  of  population.  (See 
page  13.) 


in. 


IV.      V. 


CONSUMPTION  or  COTTON 
GOODS,  FOREIGN  AND  DOM. 
in  pounds  per  head  of  the 
population.  (See  page  15). 


Total, 
DoMtlc, 


CONSUMPTION    OP   WOOLLENS, 
FOREIGN  &  DOM.,  in  Ibs.  per     6 
head  of  population.  (Seep.  17.) 


ToUl, 


Doumtic,  SH 


PRODUCTION    OF  LEAD,  in  thou- 
sands of  pigs.     (See  page  18.) 


POPULATION,  as  shown  in  the 
increase  of  immigration,  in 
thousands.  (See  page  18.) 


34 


THE    HARMONY   OF    INTERESTS. 


n.         m. 


nr.        y.        ir. 


SHIPPING  BUILT,  tn  tons,  per  }J 
thousand  of  population.  (See  [J 
page  19.) 


COMPARATIVE    VIEW  OP    THE 


(See  page  19.) 


MOVEMENT  OP  IMMIGRATION   go 

AND  SHIPPING,  in  thousands.    MO 

no 

260 
250 
240 
230 
230 
210 
200 
180 
ISO 
170 
ISO 
160 
140 


Shipping 


NUMBER  OP  STEAMERS  BUILT, 
per  million  of  population.  (See 
page  19.) 


DEPOPULATION,  as  shown  in  the 
occupation  of  PUBLIC  LANDS, 
as  compared  with  immigra- 
tion. (See  page  20.) 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 


35 


rv.    v.    n. 


PRODUCTION  OF  GRAIN,  in  bush- 
els per  head  of  population.  (See 
page  21.) 


PRODUCTION  AND  CONSUMP- 
TION OF  SUGAR,  FOREIGN 
AND  DOMESTIC,  in  pounds 
per  head  of  population.  (See 
page  23.) 


Total, 


Dcwuttic, 


TOLLS  ON  THE  NEW  YORK 
CANALStn  dollars  per  thou- 
sand of  population.  (See 
page  24.) 


TOLLS  ON  PENNSYLVANIA  PUB- 
LIC WORKS,  in  dollars  per 
thousand  of  population.  (See 
page  24.) 


^EXS^tiU 

.   n 


TOLLS  ON  BALTIMORE  AND  OHIO  «, 
RAILROAD,  in  dollars  per  thou-  ™ 
sand  of  popidntion.  (See  page  *> 


TRADE  ON  LOUISVILLE  AND  3^, 
PORTLAND  CANAL,  in  thou-  ™ 
sands  of  tons  (See  page  24.)  *» 


36 


THE   HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 


LAKE  TONNAGE,  in  thousands  \ 
of  tons.    (See  page  24.)  | 


m.      IT.   T.     TL 


WESTERN  STEAMBOAT  TONNAGE, 
in   thousands    of  tons.      (See  *"> 
page  24.) 

180 
100 
140 
120 
100 
80 


VALUE  OF  PRODUCE  RECEIVED 
AT  NEW  ORLEANS,  in  millions 
of  dollars.  (See  page  25.) 


HOUSES  BUILT  IN  NEW  YORK, 
per  million  of  population.  (See 
page  25.) 


POPULATION    or   PHILADEL- 
PHIA, in  thousands. 


RATIO  OF  PHILADELPHIA  TO 
THE  POPULATION  OF  THE    " 
UNION,  in  thousands  to  mil-     n 
lions.     (See  page  25.) 


VALUE  OF  EXPORTS,  per  head 
of  population  in  dollars.  (See  70° 
page  25.) 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 


37 


FOREIGN  DEBT,  in  millions  of 
dollars.    (See  page  25.) 


IMPORTS  OP  FOREIGN  WOOLLENS, 
paid  for  by  our  exports,  in  cents 
per  head  of  the  population. 
(See  page  16.) 


IMPORTS  OP  FOREIGN  COTTON 
GOODS,  paid  for  by  our  exports, 
in  cents  per  head  of  the  papula- 
tion-.  (See  page  15.) 


in.     rv.    v.     vi. 


Of  the  four  next  following,  the  first  two,  French  Merchandise  and  Manu- 
factures of  flax,  were  in  a  great,  degree  freed  from  duty  in  1832,  silks  and 
linens  being  declared  absolutely  free.  The  duty  was  reimposed  in  1841.  The 
others,  Tea  and  Coffee,  were  free  from  duty  in  1832,  and  so  remain.  The  first 
two  are  given  chiefly  for  the  purpose  of  showing  how  small  is  the  increase  of 
consumption  consequent  upon  a  remission  of  duty,  compared  with  that  which, 
in  every  case,  we  have  seen  to  follow  the  production  of  a  commodity  at  home. 


FRENCH  MERCHANDISE,  paid  for 
in  cents  per  head  of  the  popu- 
lation. (See  page  26.) 


MANUFACTURES  OP  FLAX,    in 
cents  per  head  of  the  popula-  *> 
tion.     (See  page  26.) 


CONSUMPTION  OP  TEA,  in  hun- 
dredths  of  pounds  per  head  of 
the  population.  (See  page 
27.) 


-«- 


38 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 


CONSUMPTION   OF  COFFEE,  in    *£ 
pounds  per  head  of  the  popu- 
lation.    (See  page  27.) 


m. 


IV.     T.       VL 


REVENUE  FROM  CUSTOMS,  in 
cents  per  head  of  the  popular  K 
tion.     (See  page  28.) 


1821—29 


1842   1846 
—45   —49 


PUBLIC  EXPENDITURE,  in  mil- 
lions of  dollars.     (See  page 


PUBLIC  DEBT,  in  millions  of 
dollars.     (See  page  31.) 


NATIONAL  CREDIT,  in  millions  » 
of  dollars.     (See  page  31.)       «! 

X  °  '  190 


- 
i— i 

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02 


0$ 

w 

fe 

O 

PH 


O 

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o 
O 


o 


S    HH     o 


I 


a 


39 


I 


O 

H 


8 


O 

fe 

H- ( 

a 


O 


= 
O 
X 


O 

- 


o 

H  £ 

a:  < 

K  r 

^  »  5 

.0  o  S 


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40 


THE   HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS.  4l 


CHAPTER  FOURTH. 
HOW  PROTECTION  TENDS   TO   INCREASE  PRODUCTION  AND   CONSUMPTION. 

Two  systems  are  before  the  world :  on  the  one  hand,  that  which  is  de- 
nominated protection,  and  on  the  other  that  which  is  denominated  free-trade. 
Each  claims  to  be  the  one  under  which  the  labourer  receives  the  largest  re- 
ward for  his  exertions,  and  it  is  for  the  purpose  of  testing  the  validity  of  those 
claims  that  I  have  given  the  numerous  tables  contained  in  the  last  chapter, 
by  aid  of  which  I  now  propose  to  examine  this  question  in  its  bearings  on  the 
various  portions  of  society.  It  is  the  great  one  for  the  Union,  for  in  it  are 
included  all  others.  The  discord  now  existing  between  the  North  and  the 
South  has  its  origin  in  the  diminished  value  of  the  returns  to  slave  labour. 
If  it  can  be  shown  that  by  one  and  the  same  system  the  interests  of  the  North 
and  the  South,  the  free  and  the  enslaved,  can  be  promoted,  harmony  may 
take  the  place  of  discord.  The  differences  in  regard  to  internal  improve- 
ments by  aid  of  the  general  government  have  their  origin  in  a  necessity  for 
scattering  ourselves  prematurely  over  large  surfaces.  If  it  can  be  shown  that 
by  one  and  the  same  system  the  North,  the  South,  the  East,  and  the  West, 
can  be  enriched,  and  all  enabled  to  make  roads  for  themselves,  harmony  may 
be  restored.  The  discords  so  frequently  existing  between  the  employer  and 
the  employed,  the  capitalist  and  the  labourer,  the  banker  and  his  customers, 
may  all,  as  I  think,  be  traced  to  one  and  the  same  cause,  and  if  that  can  be 
removed,  harmony  and  good  feeling  may  be  restored  and  maintained.  Every 
question  affecting  the  peace  and  tranquillity  of  the  Union,  or  the  people  of  the 
Union,  will  be  settled  whenever  we  shall  have  determined  for  ourselves  the 
one  great  question — "  Which  is  the  system  under  which  the  labourer  obtains 
the  largest  reward  for  his  labour  ?"  When  that  shall  come  to  be  done,  it 
will  be  seen  that  there  is  a  perfect  harmony  of  interests  throughout  the  Union, 
and  among  all  its  people. 

Before  proceeding  further,  I  would  urge  upon  the  reader  a  careful  examina 
tion  of  those  tables,  bearing  always  in  mind  the  precise  position  of  the  ques- 
tion that  is  to  be  discussed.  It  is  admitted  by  all  that  protection  tends  to 
increase  the  domestic  production  of  the  commodity  protected.  That,  there- 
fore, does  not  require  to  be  proved.  It  is  asserted  that  protection  tends  to 
raise  the  price  of  the  protected  article  and  to  diminish  the  power  of  consuming 
it,  whereas  the  removal  of  protection  diminishes  its  cost  and  increases  the  power 
of  consumption.  That  is  denied,  and  that  it  is  which  requires  to  be  proved. 
If  this  assertion  be  true,  then  the  power  of  consumption  must  diminish  with 
protection.  We  see,  however,  that  the  consumption  of  iron,  of  coal,  of 
cotton,  and  of  wool,  increased  with  great  rapidity  in  the  years  between  1830 
and  1834,  and  in  those  from  1843  to  1847.  If  it  be  true,  the  quantity 
of  men  and  things  passing  on  the  roads  and  canals,  and  the  number  of  ex- 
changes to  be  performed  in  our  cities,  should  diminish  with  protection, 


42  THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 

whereas  they  increased  with  great  rapidity  in  both  of  the  above-named 
periods.  If  it  be  true,  then  it  must  reduce  the  wages  of  labour,  and  thus 
diminish  the  inducements  for  foreigners  to  come  among  us  and  occupy  our 
vacant  lands,  whereas  immigration  increased  with  great  rapidity  under  both 
protective  tariffs.  If  it  be  true,  then  it  must  diminish  our  power  to  trade 
with  foreign  nations,  and  the  inducements  to  build  ships,  whereas  shipping 
grew  with  great  rapidity  in  both  those  periods. 

If,  now,  we  examine  the  period  between  1834  and  1843,  it  is  impossible 
to  avoid  being  struck  with  the  fact  that  the  power  to  consume  foreign  pro- 
ducts not  only  did  not  increase  as  domestic  production  diminished  with  the 
approach  to  free  trade,  but  that  it  was  actually  less  in  quantity  than  under 
the  system  of  protection.  The  building  of  furnaces  and  rolling-mills  was 
stopped,  yet  we  consumed  less  foreign  iron  than  before.  So  was  it  with 
cotton  goods,  the  import  of  which  fell  from  above  fifty  millions  of  yards 
down  to  eight  millions.  We  killed  off  our  sheep,  but  the  importation  of 
foreign  cloth  diminished.  We  prevented  increase  in  the  domestic  consumption 
of  cotton,  but  shipping  did  not  grow  with  the  increased  necessity  for  depending 
on  foreign  markets.  We  adopted  a  course  that  we  were  assured  would  raise 
the  wages  of  labour,  but  immigration  ceased  to  grow.  So  is  it  now.  The 
building  of  cotton-mills  is  stopped,  but  our  whole  import  of  last  year,  in 
which  we  incurred  a  debt  of  twenty-two  millioms,  but  little  exceeded  a  pound 
per  head.  We  have  closed  furnaces  and  rolling-mills,  but  we  consume  far  less 
iron  than  before.  We  have  abolished  the  system  that  was  regarded  as  "a 
war  upon  labour  and  capital,"  yet  immigration  is  diminishing  and  there  is  no 
demand  for  capital.  Steam-engines  are  idle,  and  there  is  no  demand  for  new 
ones,  except  for  a  few  steam-vessels.  Railroad  tolls  are  diminishing,  and  steam- 
boats on  the  Western  waters  are  idle.  Iron  is  low  in  price,  but  it  is  not 
wanted.  So  is  coal.  So  are  cottons  and  woollens.  So  is  almost  every  de- 
scription of  merchaadise.  The  power  of  consumption  is  diminishing,  because 
the  demand  for  labour  and  capital  has  largely  diminished. 

The  power  of  the  people  to  pay  taxes  for  the  support  of  government  is 
dependent  upon  their  power  to  consume  commodities  that  are  taxed,  and  if 
protection  diminished  wages,  it  must  of  course  diminish  revenue ;  but  when 
we  examine  the  facts,  it  is  shown  that,  notwithstanding  a  great  increase  of  the 
free-list,  the  revenue  increased  under  the  tariff  of  1828,  and  fell  off  so  much 
afterwards  that  the  government  was  compelled  almost  to  beg  for  loans  in  the 
markets  of  Europe.  With  the  tariff  of  1842  it  grew  rapidly,  but  with  that 
of  1846  it  is  diminishing  in  actual  amount  per  head,  notwithstanding  the 
purchase  of  more  than  twenty  millions  of  goods  on  credit  in  a  single  year. 
If  that  debt  were  now  called  for,  the  revenue  of  the  current  year  would  not 
exceed  that  of  1842. 

The  question  to  be  settled  is — "Does  the  power  to  import  grow  with  the 
diminution  in  the  power  to  produce  that  follows  the  withdrawal  of  protection  ?" 
If  it  does,  the  facts  must  prove  it.  There  is  no  question  that  the  power  to 
produce  iron  and  cloth  grows  with  protection.  That  is,  as  I  have  already 
said,  admitted  by  all.  Were  it  not,  the  facts  prove  it.  The  burden  of 
proof  lies,  then,  with  the  opponents  of  protection.  To  establish  their  system 
they  must  show  that  the  power  of  production  and  consumption  grows  now  as  it 
grew  three  years  since,  and  that  it  grew  from  1835  to  1843  as  it  grew  from 
1830  to  1834. 

The  first  thing  that  must  strike  all  who  examine  the  tables  in  the  last 
chapter  is  the  unive  sally  diminutive  amount  of  foreign  products  received  in 
exchange  for  the  vast  bulk  of  cotton,  grain,  provisions,  &c.,  sent  to  foreign 
countries.  Thus  in  1842-'43  the  import  of  cotton  cloth  was  much  less  than 
a  yard  per  head  of  the  population,  and  less  probably  than  one-fourth  of  a 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  43 

pound  of  cotton.  In  other  years  we  see  that  it  has  varied  from  two  to 
four  yards,  but  in  no  single  year  has  our  consumption  of  cotton  that  has 
passed  through  foreign  looms  materially  exceeded  a  pound  per  head. 

The  returns  from  Europe  received  for  all  our  products  may  be  summed 
up  nearly  as  follows:  fifty  cents'  worth  of  iron,  half  a  pound  of  wool,  about 
as  much  flax,  one  or  two  ounces  of  silk,  and  China  and  earthenware  equiva- 
lent to  a  tolerable  cup  and  saucer,  to  which  may  be  added  the  twisting  and 
weaving  of  a  pound  and  a  half  of  cotton,  per  head.  To  obtain  all  this  we 
give  a  large  portion  of  the  land  and  labour  of  the  cotton-growing  States,  and 
of  those  employed  in  raising  tobacco  and  rice,  together  with  as  much  food 
as  would  feed  men,  women,  and  children  who  could  twist  and  weave  five 
times  the  cotton,  wool,  silk,  and  flax  we  import,  and  the  use  of  more  capital 
in  horses,  wagons,  railroads,  engines  and  cars,  steam  and  canal  boats,  ships, 
wharves  and  warehouses,  than  would  be  necessary  for  machinery  to  con- 
vert all  our  cotton  into  cloth,  and  make  more  iron  than  has  ever  been  made 
in  Britain,  and  almost  as  much  labour  as  would  do  the  work — and  withal, 
we  are  brought  in  debt.  It  is  certainly  using  great  means  for  the  ac- 
complishment of  small  ends. 

Every  portion  of  the  tables  tends  to  prove  that  while  the  amount  of 
foreign  commodities  received  in  payment  for  our  exports  increased  in  the 
period  from  1829  to  1834,  it  diminished  in  that  from  1835  to  1841 — still  fur- 
ther diminished  in  the  years  1842  and  1843,  and  then  rose  rapidly  from 
1844  to  1847,  since  which  time  it  has  declined.  These  facts  seem  to 
warrant  the  conclusion  that  the  ability  to  consume  foreign  products,  by 
both  labourer  and  capitalist,  increased  under  the  two  tariffs  of  protection, 
and  declined  with  every  approach  to  free  trade.  If,  now,  we  desire  to  un- 
derstand how  such  should  be  the  case,  it  may  be  useful  to  examine  how  it 
is  with  individuals,  and,  doing  so,  we  shall  find  that  the  man  who  produces 
most  largely  of  the  articles  of  prime  necessity  is  always  the  one  who  can 
indulge  most  freely  in  the  luxuries  of  life ;  and  vice  versa,  that  the  farmer 
who  obtains  from  his  land  the  least  food,  is  the  one  who  can  least  indulge 
in  clothing,  coffee,  tea,  or  books. 

What  is  further  to  be  remarked  is,  that  any  material  increase  in  the  con- 
sumption of  foreign  products,  consequent  upon  the  approach  to  freedom  of 
trade,  has  appeared  to  be  followed  by  exhaustion  and  bankruptcy,  while  every 
increase  in  production  at  home,  consequent  upon  protection,  has  been  but  the 
preparation  for  a  new  and  larger  increase — sometimes  so  great  as  to  cause  a 
feeling  of  apprehension  that  it  was  unnatural,  and  could  not  be  maintained.  To 
what  extent  this  could  be  carried  has  never  been  ascertained,  for  the  only 
two  periods  of  perfect  protection  have  each  been  limited  to  four  years.  To 
understand  the  cause  of  this,  it  would  be  well  for  the  inquirer  to  examine  for 
himself  the  facts  that  become  obvious  to  sight,  whenever  and  wherever  a 
factory  or  furnace  has  recently  been  set  in  operation.  Those  presented  at 
Graniteville,  S.  C.,  are  thus  described  by  a  highly  intelligent  correspondent 
of  "The  New  York  Herald  :"— 

"  The  effect  of  the  erection  of  this  manufactory  in  the  neighbourhood  is  almost  magical. 
Hundreds  have  found  employment  among  the  poor  of  the  white  inhabitants,  who  were, 
before,  almost  destitute.  A  Methodist  and  a  Baptist  church  have  been  erected.  A  free 
school  has  been  opened,  and  al>out  70  pupils  attend.  There  is  a  large  and  convenient 
hotel,  where  I  am  writing  this  letter.  The  town  is  laid  out  in  streets,  and  already  over 
80  dwelling-houses,  very  neat  and  comfortable,  with  gardens  attached,  have  been  put  up, 
which  rent  from  $16  to  $25  per  annum.  The  girls  in  the  factory  are,  some  of  them,  very 
pretty,  and  are  well  dressed;  and,  from  what  I  can  learn,  the  change  in  their  appear- 
ance is  extraordinary.  The  superintendent,  Mr.  George  Kelly,  who  came  out  here  and 
placed  the  factory  in  operation,  went  with  me  through  the  manufactory  and  town.  He 
informed  me  that  he  only  brought  with  him  four  or  five  experienced  persons  from  tho 


44  THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 

North — all  the  rest  in  the  factory,  about  300,  men,  women,  and  children,  are  from  the 
Sand  Hills  and  immediate  vicinity,  where  they,  one  year  ago,  were  earning  nothing. 
They  make  now  from  four  to  five  dollars,  (males.)  females  from  three  to  four  dollars,  and 
children  one  to  two  dollars  per  week.  Some  of  the  girls,  who  are  now  well  dressed  and 
appear  very  intelligent,  a  year  ago  were  at  work  in  the  field,  hoeing  corn,  or  ploughing 
with  a  horse;  others  were  idle;  now  they  reside  in  comfortable  boarding-houses,  where 
they  pay  $1-50  per  week  for  board,  and  can  lay  up  money.  Their  education  is  attended 
to,  and  they  are  on  the  road  to  become  useful  and  productive  citizens.  In  fact,  since 
Christmas,  over  forty  marriages  have  taken  place  between  the  young  male  and  female 
operatives  in  the  factory.  They  were  brought  together  in  it,  became  attached,  and  got 
married.  In  such  a  case,  the  wife  generally  leaves  the  factory  to  attend  to  the  house- 
keeping arrangements  of  the  new  couple,  and  the  husband  continues  in  the  factory,  which 
gives  them  an  independent  support. 

"  Tho  grounds  around  the  factory  are  laid  out  with  a  great  deal  of  taste,  and  I  have  not 
seen,  in  a  long  while,  a  more  prosperous  and  thriving  place.  New  houses  are  going  up 
every  week.  The  applications  for  work  are  double  what  they  can  possibly  employ. 
They  could  obtain,  in  the  district,  400  male  and  female  operators,  who  are  without  any 
work,  if  they  could  give  them  employment." 

The  following  account  by  Mr.  Bryant,  Editor  of  "  The  Evening  Post," 
is  descriptive  of  facts  presented  by  a  mill  recently  erected  in  Barnwell 
District,  S.  C.  :— 

"  The  girls  of  various  ages,  who  are  employed  at  the  spindles,  had,  for  the  most  part, 
a  sallow,  sickly  complexion,  and  in  many  of  their  faces  I  remarked  that  look  of  mingled 
distrust  and  dejection  which  often  accompanies  the  condition  of  extreme,  hopeless  poverty. 
'These  poor  girls,'  said  one  of  our  party, '  think  themselves  extremely  fortunate  to  be  em- 
ployed here,  and  accept  work  gladly.  They  come  from  the  most  barren  parts  of  Carolina 
and  Georgia,  where  their  families  live  wretchedly,  for  hitherto  there  has  been  no  manual 
occupation  provided  for  them,  from  which  they  do  not  shrink  as  disgraceful,  on  account 
of  its  being  the  occupation  of  slaves.  In  these  factories,  negroes  are  not  employed  as 
operatives,  and  this  gives  the  calling  of  the  factory  girl  a  certain  dignity.  You  would  be 
surprised  to  see  the  change  which  a  short  time  effects  in  these  poor  people.  They  come 
bare-footed,  dirty,  and  in  rags ;  they  are  scoured,  put  into  shoes  and  stockings,  set  at  work, 
and  sent  regularly  to  Sunday-school,  where  they  are  taught  what  none  of  them  have  been 
taught  before — to  read  and  write.  In  a  short  time,  they  become  expert  at  their  work; 
they  lose  their  sullen  shyness,  and  their  physiognomy  becomes  comparatively  open  and 
cheerful.  Their  families  are  relieved  from  the  temptations  to  theft  and  other  shameful 
courses  which  accompany  the  condition  of  poverty  without  occupation.'  " 

He  adds  that  "  at  Graniteville,  in  South  Carolina,  about  ten  miles  from  the  Savannah 
river,  a  little  manufacturing  village  has  lately  been  built  up,  where  the  families  of  the 
crackers,  as  they  are  called,  reclaimed ,  from  their  idle  lives  in  the  woods,  are  settled  and 
white  labour  only  is  employed.  The  enterprise  is  said  to  be  in  a  most  prosperous  con- 
dition." 

«  The  buildings  are  erected  here  more  cheaply,"  he  continued ;  « there  is  far  less  ex- 
pense in  fuel,  and  the  wages  of  the  work-people  are  less.  At  first,  the  boys  and  girls  of 
the  '  crasker  families  were  engaged  for  little  more  than  their  board ;  their  wages  are  now 
better,  but  they  are  still  low.  I  am  about  to  go  to  the  North,  and  I  shall  do  my  best  to 
persuade  some  of  my  friends,  who  have  been  almost  ruined  by  this  Southern  competition, 
to  come  to  Augusta  and  set  up  cotton  mills." 

The  labour  employed  in  building  these  mills  was  clear  profit.  The 
men  and  their  families  were  there,  and  they  had  to  be  supported  by  some- 
body, whether  they  worked  or  not.  All  the  labour  employed  in  working 
the  mills  is  profit.  The  people  have  begun  to  produce.  From  unpro- 
ductive consumers  they  have  become  productive  consumers.  In  their 
former  condition  they  could  consume  scarcely  any  clothing,  or  utensils 
requiring  iron  for  their  manufacture,  or  furniture,  or  books,  or  newspapers — 
scarcely  any  thing,  indeed,  but  food.  Having  become  productive,  the 
whole  surplus  may  go  to  the  purchase  of  other  things  than  food,  and  thus  is 
made  a  market  for  cloth  and  iron  and  other  commodities,  that  before  had  no 
existence.  Every  producer  is  a  consumer  to  the  whole  extent  of  his  pro- 
duction,  and  by  enabling  these  poor  people  to  produce  more,  the  planter 


THE   HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  45 

makes  a  market  on  the  land  for  the  products  of  the  land,  to  the  extent  of  the 
whole  excess  of  production.  The  more  that  is  produced,  the  more  must  be 
consumed. 

This  assertion  may  at  first  appear  to  be  one  of  doubtful  truth,  yet  a 
little  examination  will,  I  think,  suffice  to  establish  its  perfect  correctness. 
The  man  who  earns  six  dollars  a  week,  lays  by  one  of  them,  which  he  carries 
to  the  saving-fund,  which  lends  it  and  other  similar  dollars  to  some  one  who 
desires  to  build  a  house.  He  pays  it  out  to  workmen  who  purchase  with 
it  food  and  clothing,  and  thus  is  that  surplus  dollar  consumed.  The  capi- 
talist, with  his  savings,  builds  houses,  or  ships,  or  factories,  and  the  work- 
men whom  he  employs  purchase  food  and  clothing,  and  the  use  of  houses, 
with  his  money.  The  average  consumption  of  a  year  always  is  and  must 
be  equal  to  the  average  production,  and  if  we  desire  to  know  the  extent  of 
the  one  we  have  but  to  ascertain  that  of  the  other. 

In  1839  we  imported  forty-three  millions  of  yards  of  cotton  cloths  of 
various  kinds,  the  consumers  of  which  were  customers  to  the  planter  to  the 
extent  of  eleven  millions  of  pounds  of  cotton,  or  less  than  28,000  bales,  being 
as  much  as  would  be  worked  up  by  twenty-eight  mills  of  moderate  size,  or 
fourteen  of  larger  size.  To  produce  those  mills  in  any  single  cotton-growing 
State  would  require  no  effort  whatsoever,  and  when  produced  it  would  be 
found  that  they  would  be  all  profit,  for  it  would  be  attended  with  not  the 
slightest  diminution  in  the  amount  of  agricultural  production.  The  labourers 
are  there,  and  a  large  portion  of  their  time  is  absolutely  waste.  The  horses 
and  wagons  are  there,  to  a  great  extent  unemployed.  The  timber  is  there, 
encumbering  the  best  lands  of  the  plantation.  The  men  and  the  horses 
must  be  fed,  and  the  wagons  must  be  kept  in  order.  Make  a  market  foi 
this  waste  labour,  and  the  labourers  will  consume  more  food,  but  the  chief 
increase  of  expenditures  will  be  in^ "{Nothing,  thus  making  a  market  for  cot- 
ton— in  houses,  making  a  market'  for  stone  and  lumber — in  furniture,  for 
which  lumber  will  be  required — irf  books  and  newspapers,  making  a  mar- 
ket for  rags — and  the  cloth-makers,  and  carpenters,  and  masons,  and  cabinet- 
makers, and  paper-makers,  and  printers,  will  want  cloth,  and  shoes,  and 
houses,  making  a  further  market  for  cotton  and  leather,  and  lumber  and 
stone.  Exchanging  thus  on  the  spot,  each  and  every  man  would  be  a  pro- 
ducer, whereas  when  exchanges  are  made  at  great  distances,  the  transporters 
and  exchangers  are  more  numerous  than  the  producers,  and  as  consumption 
must  go  to  the  extent  of  production,  and  can  go  no  further,  we  may  now  see 
why  it  is  that  consumption  tends  to  increase  so  rapidly  when  men  work  in 
combination  with  each  other. 

In  four  years  we  erected  mills  that  worked  up  300,000  bales  of  cotton, 
or  eleven  times  as  much  as  was  contained  in  all  the  cloth  imported  in 
1839.  To  have  created  treble  that  number  would  have  required  no  effort, 
nor  would  it  have  been  attended  with  any  loss  of  agricultural  products,  for 
the  labour  was  being  wasted  in  every  county  of  the  South  and  West :  and 
to  carry  them  on  would  now  be  attended  with  no  diminution  in  the  product 
of  food  or  cotton,  for  treble  the  labour  required  for  a  factory  is  now  being 
wasted  in  almost  every  county  of  the  Union,4and  in  every  one  south  of  New 
England.  To  the  labour-power  of  men  and  horses,  and  women  and  children, 
now  absolutely  unemployed,  let  us  add.  the 'quantity  that  is  wasted  on  the 
road,  and  to  that  let  us  add  the  manure  now  wasted  on  the  road,  and  then 
we  may  form  an  estimate,  but  even  then  a  very  insufficient  one,  of  the  in- 
creased product  that  would  have  resulted  from  the  creation  of  those  mills. 
Let  us  then  reflect  that  all  these  people  are  now  fed,  and  that  their  surplus 
earnings  would  be  applicable  to  the  purchase  of  other  things  than  food,  and  we 
may  then  see  what  would  be  the  extent  of  the  market  thus  made  on  the 
land  for  the  products  of  the  land. 


46  THE    HARMONY    OF   INTERESTS. 

A  great  error  exists  in  the  impression  now  very  commonly  entertained  in 
regard  to  national  division  of  labour,  and  which  owes  its  origin  to  the  English 
school  of  political  economists,  whose  system  is  throughout  based  upon  the 
idea  of  making  England  "the  workshop  of  the  world,"  than  which  nothing 
tould  be  less  natural.  By  that  school  it  is  taught  that  some  nations  are 
fitted  for  manufactures  and  others  for  the  labours  of  agriculture,  and  that  the 
latter  are  largely  benefited  by  being  compelled  to  employ  themselves  in  the 
one  pursuit,  making  all  their  exchanges  at  a  distance,  thus  contributing 
their  share  to  the  maintenance  of  the  system  of  "  ships,  colonies,  and  com- 
merce." The  whole  basis  of  their  system  is  conversion  and  exchange,  and 
not  production,  vet  neither  makes  any  addition  to  the  amount  of  things  to 
be  exchanged.  It  is  the  great  boast  of  their  system  that  the  exchangers  are  so 
numerous  and  the  producers  so  few,*  and  the  more  rapid  the  increase  in  the 
proportion  which  the  former  bear  to  the  latter,  the  more  rapid  is  supposed  to 
be  the  advance  towards  perfect  prosperity.  Converters  and  exchangers, 
however,  must  live,  and  they  must  live  out  of  the  labour  of  others  :  and  if 
three,  five,  or  ten  persons  are  to  live  on  the  product  of  one,  it  must  follow 
that  all  will  obtain  but  a  small  allowance  of  the  necessaries  or  comforts  of 
life,  as  is  seen  to  be  the  case.  The  agricultural  labourer  of  England  often 
receives  but  seven  shillings  a  week,  being  the  price  of  a  bushel  and  a  half 
of  wheat. 

Were  it  asserted  that  some  nations  were  fitted  to  be  growers  of  wheat  and 
others  grinders  of  it,  or  that  some  were  fitted  for  cutting  down  trees  and 
others  for  sawing  them  into  lumber,  it  would  be  regarded  as  the  height  of 
absurdity,  yet  it  would  not  be  more  absurd  than  that  which  is  daily  asserted  in 
regard  to  the  conversion  of  cotton  into  cloth,  and  implicitly  believed  by  tens  of 
thousands  even  of  our  countrymen.  The  loom  is  as  appropriate  and  neces- 
sary an  aid  to  the  labours  of  the  planter  as  is  the  grist-mill  to  those  of  the 
farmer.  The  furnace  is  as  necessary  and  as  appropriate  an  aid  to  the 
labours  of  both  planter  and  farmer  as  is  the  saw-mill,  and  those  who  are 
compelled  to  dispense  with  the  proximity  of  the  producer  of  iron,  labour  to 
as  much  disadvantage  as  do  those  who  are  unable  to  obtain  the  aid  of  the 
saw-mill  and  the  miller.  The  loom  and  the  anvil  are,  like  the  plough  and 
the  harrow,  but  small  machines,  naturally  attracted  by  the  great  machine, 
the  earth,  and  when  so  attracted  all  work  together  in  harmony,  and  men 
become  rich,  and  prosperous,  and  happy.  "When,  on  the  contrary,  from 
any  disturbing  cause,  the  attraction  is  in  the  opposite  direction,  and  the 
small  machines  are  enabled  to  compel  the  products  of  the  great  machine  to 
follow  them,  the  land  invariably  becomes  poor,  and  men  become  poor  and 
miserable,  as  is  the  case  with  Ireland. 

To  those  who  doubt  the  extent  of  the  loss  resulting  from  this  unnatural 
division  of  labour,  I  would  recommend  a  visit  to  any  farm  at  a  distance  of 
thirty  or  forty  miles  from  a  furnace  or  a  factory,  that  the)'  may  there,  on  the 
ground,  satisfy  themselves  of  the  fact.  They  will  there  see  days  perpetually 
wasted  for  want  of  means  of  occupation — and  other  days  on  the  road  carrying 
to  market  small  amounts  of  produce — and  general  listlessness  resulting  from 
the  want  of  stimulus  to  activity,  on  the  part  of  the  men,  while  children, 
male  and  female,  are  totally  unemployed,  and  the  schoolmaster  remains 
abroad  for  want  of  means  to  pay  him  when  at  home.  As  a  general  rule, 

•  "  Out  of  3,400,000  families  in  Great  Britain  in  1831,  but  960,000  were  engaged  in 
agriculture,  the  work  of  production.  Between  1831  and  1841  the  number  of  adult  males 
increased  630,000,  but  the  number  of  those  employed  in  agriculture  diminished  19,000. 
The  town  population,  that  which  lives  by  the  work  of  conversion  and  exchange,  is  steadily 
increasing  in  its  ratio  to  the  producing  population,  and  as  a  necessary  consequence  there 
is  a  steady  increase  of  poverty,  vice,  and  crime. 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 


47 


our  farmers  attach  scarcely  any  value  to  time.  They  go  to  a  distant  market 
in  preference  to  selling  at  a  nearer  one,  when  the  difference  of  price  to  be 
obtained  upon  their  few  pounds  of  butter,  or  baskets  of  vegetables,  appears 
utterly  insignificant  compared  with  the  loss  of  time  and  labour,  and  they  do 
this  because  labour  is  to  so  great  an  extent  totally  valueless.  Let  the  in- 
quirer look  to  these  things  for  himself,  and  let  him  then  add  the  enormous 
proportion  of  the  labour  that  is  misemployed  in  badly  cultivating  large  sur- 
faces instead  of  small  ones — in  keeping  up  fences  and  roads  entirely  dis- 
proportioned  to  the  product  of  the  land — and  finally  let  him  add  the  waste  of 
intellect  from  the  want  of  proper  instruction  and  frequent  communication 
with  their  neighbour  men — and  then  let  him  determine  if  the  loss  is  not  Jive 
limes  over  as  great  as  would  pay  for  all  the  cloth  and  iron — raw  material 
included — consumed  upon  the  farm.  Place  the  mill  there,  and  all  this  is 
saved.  The  farmer  and  his  horses  and  wagon  are  employed  in  hauling 
stone  and  timber  for  the  mill  and  for  houses,  and  his  children  find  employ- 
ment in  the  mill,  or  in  the  production  of  things  that  can  be  used  by  those 
who  work  in  the  mill,  and  all  their  extra  earnings  may  go  for  cloth  and 
iron,  for  food  they  had  before.  I  say  all,  for  with  the  mill  come  improved 
roads,  and  the  facility  of  sending  to  market  the  many  things  for  which  a 
market  on  the  land  cannot  as  yet  be  made. 

The  mill  and  furnace,  and  the  coal  mine,  are  saving-funds,  in  which  the 
people  of  the  neighbourhood  deposit  the  labour  and  the  things  which  other- 
wise would  be  waste,  and  where  these  depositories  exist,  farmers  and 
planters  become  rich.  Where  they  do  not,  they  remain  poor.  To  those 
who  desire  to  understand  the  wonderful  effectwof  the  daily  deposit  of  small 
quantities  of  labour,  I  would  recommend  an  examination  of  the  saving-fund 
system  of  Europe  and  this  country.  They  will  there  see  how  much  can  be 
accumulated  from  small  savings  when  a  safe  place  of  deposit  is  offered,  and 
thence  can  form  a  judgment  of  how  much  is  liable  to  be  wasted  for  want  of 
such  institutions.  The  people  of  New  England  have  saving-funds  in  which 
they  deposit  what  would  be  otherwise  the  waste  labour  of  themselves,  their 
horses  and  wagons,  their  sons  and  their  daughters,  and  much  of  the  produce 
that  would  otherwise  be  wasted,  making  by  the  very  act  a  market  on  the 
land  for  the  products  of  the  land,  and  thus  are  enabled  to  save  the  manure, 
and  they  grow  rich  because  of  these  economies.  The  people  of  other 
States  waste  labour,  and  water-power,  and  produce  of  various  kinds,  and 
then  they  destroy  their  timber  for  want  of  a  market  for  it,  and  they  waste 
their  manure,  and  thus  it  is  that  they  remain  poor  because  of  this  extrava- 
gance. One  cent  per  day  for  each  person  of  the  nation  is  almost  eighty 
millions  of  dollars  in  a  year.  Is  there  not  wasted,  for  want  of  a  demand  for 
it,  labour  to  quintuple  that  sum  per  head  ?  If  so,  the  amount  is  four  hundred 
millions  of  dollars,  or  forty  times  the  price — raw  material  included — of  all 
the  cotton  cloths  we  can  afford  to  buy  from  abroad. 

Were  all  this  saved,  it  would  make  a  market  for  four  hundred  millions 
of  dollars  of  cottons  and  woollens,  of  linens,  iron,  hardware,  agricultural  im- 
plements, coal,  and  all  of  the  thousand  other  things  required  for  the  comfort 
and  enjoyment  of  life.  I  say  four  hundred  millions  of  those  things,  for  food 
they  had  before,  and  as  they  are  all  consumers  to  the  whole  extent  of  their 
production,  they  must  expend  almost  the  whole  extra  production  in  other 
things  than  food.  To  the  extent  of  these  four  hundred  millions  they  would 
be  customers  to  the  land  and  its  owner,  for  the  earth  is  the  sole  producer. 

Should  the  inquirer  desire  to  view  the  effect  of  this  waste  of  labour,  on  a 
large  scale,  he  could  not  now  do  better  than  visit  the  valley  of  the  Schuyl- 
kill.  Doing  so,  he  would  find  there  all  the  labour  and  all  the  machine- 
power  requisite  for  the  production  at  market  of  60,000  tons  of  coal  per  week, 


48  THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 

worth  about  $240.000.  The  quantity  that  will  go  to  market  this  year  will 
be  about  30,000  tons  per  week,  worth  $120,000.  Here  is  a  diminution  in 
the  article  of  coal  alone,  to  the  extent  of  six  millions  of  dollars,  and  if  we 
were  to  add  the  loss  from  iron  it  would  increase  greatly  the  amount.  Having 
ascertained  this,  if  he  should  then  inquire  what  was  being  produced  to 
make  amends  for  this,  he  would  find  it  literally  nothing.  The  men  are 
there,  and  their  wives  and  families  are  there,  and  they  must  have  food,  and 
that  they  may  obtain  it  hundreds  and  thousands  are  cultivating  potato 
patches ;  but  the  whole  value  produced  to  take  the  place  of  the  coal  and 
iron  not  produced,  is  so  small  as  scarcely  to  be  worth  the  slightest  notice. 

The  labour-power  now  being  wasted  in  that  valley  is  more  than  would 
pay  for  all  the  iron  and  coal  we  have  imported,  and  for  which  we  have  to 
pay  in  wheat  or  cotton.  If,  now,  we  follow  this  six  millions,  we  can  find  it 
everywhere  diminishing  the  power  of  the  labourer  and  the  miner  to  con- 
sume food  or  cloth,  to  the  loss  of  both  farmer  and  planter — diminishing  the 
demand  for  the  labour,  and  consequently  the  reward  of  the  labourer  and  of  the 
mechanic — diminishing  the  power  of  railroad  owners  to  construct  new  roads, 
and  thus  again  diminishing  the  demand  for  labour,  and  the  power  to  pay 
for  cloth  or  food  :  and  thus  may  it  be  traced,  step  by  step,  throughout  the 
whole  nation,  every  interest  taking  its  share  of  the  loss. 

Let  the  inquirer  next  visit  a  factory  of  any  kind,  and  he  will  see  that  the 
whole  value  of  the  labour  there  employed  is  a  creation  that  owes  its  existence 
to  the  fact  that  the  mill  has  been  built  to  be  a  saving-fund  in  which  each 
family  may  deposit  the  labour,  physical  and  mental,  that  would  otherwise 
be  wasted,"  receiving  in  exchange  the  cloth,  the  hats  and  coats,  the  shoes  and 
stockings,  the  books  and  newspapers,  that  could  not  otherwise  have  been 
obtained.  Let  him  then  trace  these  savings,  and  he  will  find  them  pro- 
ducing an  increased  demand  for  food — and  better  food — a  demand  for  cotton, 
and  wool,  and  iron,  and  fuel,  and  all  other  of  the  products  of  the  earth,  to 
the  benefit  of  every  owner  or  cultivator  of  land,  whether  farmer  or  planter. 

The  people  of  New  England  save  labour,  and  doing  so  they  grow  rich, 
und  are  enabled  to  make  roads  by  which  they  travel  rapidly  to  market,  and 
they  save  the  refuse  of  their  products,  which  goes  back  upon  the  land,  and 
that  also  grows  rich.  The  people  of  the  South  and  West,  for  want  of  such 
labour-saving-funds,  waste  more  time  than  would  pay  many  times  over  for 
all  the  cloth  and  iron  they  can  consume  ;  and  then  they  are  unable  to  make 
roads,  the  consequence  of  which  is  that  the  conveyance  to  market  is  costly 
They  have  to  go  to  a  distance  for  the  performance  of  every  exchange,  how- 
ever small.  Their  necessities  for  making  roads  are  great,  but  their  power 
to  make  roads  is  small.  They  waste  all  the  refuse  of  their  land,  which  is 
exhausted,  and  then  they  run  away  to  other  lands,  increasing  their  necessi- 
ties and  diminishing  their  power. 

But,  it  is  asked,  cannot  too  much  coal  and  iron,  cotton,  wheat,  and  other 
of  the  good  things  of  the  world  be  produced — more  than  can  be  consumed  ? 
Those  who  ask  this  question  do  not  recollect  that  every  man  is  a  consumer 
to  the  whole  extent  of  his  production.  The  more  coal  and  iron  are  produced, 
the  more  wheat  and  cotton  are  consumed.  The  more  wheat  and  cotton  are 
produced,  the  more  coal  and  iron  are  consumed.  Consumption  and  production 
go  hand  in  hand,  and  when  there  is  a  glut  of  any  thing  it  is  the  result  of 
error  in  the  system  that  requires  to  be  corrected. 

Coal  is  now  superabundant.  The  market  is  overloaded  with  a  quamity 
smaller  than  that  which  was  readily  consumed  two  years  since,  and  less  by 
one-third  than  would  be  now  required,  had  the  power  of  consumption  in- 
creased at  the  same  rate  as  during  the  period  from  1843  to  1847.  The 
friends  of  the  existing  system  point  to  the  trivial  import  of  foreign  coal,  and 


THE    HARMONY   OF    INTERESTS. 


say  that  the  cause  of  diminished  product  cannot  there  be  found.  They  are 
right,  but  in  so  saying  they  condemn  the  system.  The  duty  on  coal  was 
reduced  in  order  that  the  labourer  might  obtain  fuel  more  readily,  but  it  has 
become  so  much  more  difficult  to  procure  it  that  the  consumption  is  already 
sensibly  diminished,  with  every  prospect  of  a  further  diminution.  The 
total  import  of  iron,  and  of  cotton  cloth,  is  as  nothing  compared  with  the 
growth  of  the  product  in  the  years  from  1843  to  1847,  and  thus  we  see  that 
the  supply  diminishes  instead  of  increasing  in  its  ratio  to  population,  under 
a  system  that  was  to  enable  the  labourer,  and  the  farmer  and  planter,  more 
readily  to  obtain  cloth  and  iron. 

It  is  not  so  much  that  coal  needs  protection  for  itself — or  that  iron  or  cot- 
ton need  it  for  themselves — but  that  each  needs  it  for  the  other.  The  producer 
of  coal  suffers  because  the  furnace  is  closed,  and  the  producer  of  iron  suffers 
because  the  factories  are  no  longer  built,  and  the  maker  of  cloth  suffers  be- 
cause labour  is  everywhere  being  wasted,  and  the  power  to  buy  cloth  is 
diminished.  The  harmony  of  interests — agricultural  and  manufacturing — 
is  as  perfect  as  is  that  of  the  movements  of  a  watch,  and  no  one  can  suffer 
without  producing  injury  among  all  around.  The  grower  of  cotton  suffers 
when  the  operatives  in  cotton  factories  and  the  workers  in  mines  and  fur- 
naces are  unemployed,  and  the  latter  suffer  when  adverse  circumstances 
diminish  the  return  to  the  labour  of  the  farmer  and  planter. 

There  are  more  labour  and  the  products  of  labour  wasted  in  the  States 
south  of  Mason  and  Dixon's  line,  than  would,  ten  times  over,  convert  into 
cloth  all  the  cotton  they  produce,  and  more  in  the  States  north  of  it,  than 
would,  ten  times  over,  produce  all  the  iron  made  in  Great  Britain.  This 
may  appear  a  large  statement,  yet  it  is  less  than  the  truth,  as  will  be  clearly 
seen  on  examination.  If  evidence  of  this  be  desired,  look  to  the  fact 
that  the  manufacture  of  cottons  and  woollens  doubled  in  five  years — 
and  that  of  iron,  which  in  1843  was  under  250,000  tons,  reached  nearly 
800,000  in  1847.  Did  this  diminish  the  products  of  agriculture?  Was 
natron  the  contrary,  the  supply  greater  than  was  ever  before  known?  We 
added  at  least  two  hundred  millions  in  manufactures,  not  only  without 
diminution  elsewhere,  but  with  a  larger  increase  than  had  ever  before  taken 
place,  and  it  was  precisely  when  the  home  consumption  had  become  so  im- 
mense that  the  assertion  was  made  that  we  had  three  hundred  millions  of 
bushels  of  food  for  which  we  needed  a  market.  All  this  labour  was  saved 
labour,  and  much  of  the  things  employed  would  otherwise  have  been  wasted. 

Look  next  to  the  other  fact,  that  it  was  precisely  when  the  growth  of 
manufactures  was  arrested,  from  1835  to  1839,  that  the  supply  of  food  be- 
came so  short  that,  notwithstanding  diminished  consumption  consequent 
upon  high  prices,  we  were  compelled  to  import  wheat  to  the  amount  of 
more  than  four  millions  of  dollars  in  a  single  year,  and  it  will  be  seen  if 
the  experience  of  the  two  periods — 1S35-'41,  and  1844-'47 — does  not 
prove  conclusively  that  the  nearer  the  loom  and  the  anvil  are  brought  to  the 
plough,  the  larger  is  the  return  to  the  labours  of  the  ploughman.  Could  it 
be  otherwise  ?  The  nearer  the  place  of  exchange,  the  less  of  labour  and 
manure  are  wasted  on  the  road,  and  the  more  uninterruptedly  is  labour 
applied,  upon  a  machine  constantly  increasing  in  its  powers.  The  demand 
for  lumber  enables  the  fanner  to  sell  his  trees,  and  with  the  product  he 
drains  his  land,  and  thus  is  enabled  to  cultivate  more  and  better  land.  The 
more  distant  the  loom  and  the  anvil,  the  more  labour  and  manure  are  wasted  on 
the  road,  the  less  of  both  can  be  given  to  the  land,  and  the  best  lands  neces- 
sarily remain  encumbered  with  trees  that  are  valueless,  because  the  labour 
of  clearing  them  is  more  than  they  are  worth  when  cleared. 

That  the  reward  of  the  labourer  advances  under  the  protective  system  i» 


50  THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 

obvious  from  the  fact  that  immigration  increases.  Men  go  from  low  wages 
to  seek  high  ones.  From  1829  to  1834  immigration  grew.  Thence  to 
1843  it  was  almost  stationary.  Thence  to  the  present  time  it  has  increased 
Avith  vast  rapidity.  Henceforward,  if  the  existing  system  be  maintained, 
it  must  diminish,  for  the  power  to  obtain  food  and  clothing,  fuel  and  house- 
room,  wages,  has  declined. 

That  the  productiveness  of  labour  increases  is  obvious  from  the  rapid 
growth  of  canal  and  railroad  tolls,  and  their  stationary  condition  with  every 
approach  to  the  policy  that  tends  to  the  separation  of  the  loom  and  the  anvil 
from  the  plough  and  the  harrow.  So  again  with  the  growth  of  steamboats, 
and  of  vessels  generally.  The  more  there  is  produced,  the  more  can  be 
consumed,  and  the  more  will  go  to  market. 

There  is,  as  it  appears  to  me,  no  single  point  of  view  from  which  we  re- 
gard the  facts  now  passing  before  our  eyes,  in  which  we  shall  not  find  con- 
firmation of  the  correctness  of  these  views.  Were  all  the  machinery  now 
used  in  Lowell  and  Providence,  for  the  manufacture  of  coarse  cloths,  taken 
out  and  replaced  by  that  fitted  for  making  fine  cloths,  and  muslins,  and  silks, 
the  product  would  be  ten  times  as  much  as  we  now  import,  with  little 
increase  in  the  quantity  of  labour  employed.  Were  all  that  coarse  ma- 
chinery then  distributed  throughout  the  South,  it  would  enable  the  people 
of  Southern  States  to  convert  intocloth  three  hundred  thousand  additional  bales 
of  cotton,  not  only  without  diminution  in  the  agricultural  export,  but  with 
an  increase,  for  labour  would  then  be  more  advantageously  applied.  To 
accomplish  all  this,  by  building  mills  and  making  machinery,  would  require 
an  amount  of  labour -equal  to  but  a  very  small  portion  of  that  which  is  now 
wasted  in  a  single  year,  and  not  as  much  as  is  this  year  wasted  in  Penn- 
sylvania alone. 

The  people  of  the  North  would  then  have  called  into  action  a  higher  de- 
gree of  intellect  than  is  now  required,  and  wages  would  rise,  and  the 
consumption  of  woollen  and  cotton  cloth,  of  silks,  and  of  sugar,  and  tea,  and 
coffee,  would  grow  rapidly.  The  people  of  the  South  would  find  the  s%me 
effects.  Their  own  consumption  of  cotton  would  be  quintupled,  while  they 
would  consume  more  and  better  food  than  now.  They  would  need  better 
houses,  and  the  demand  for  timber  and  stone  would  clear  their  land,  and 
wealth  and  population  would  give  them  better  roads,  and  the  men  who  came 
to  make  roads  would  eat  food  and  wear  coarse  cottons,  and  thus  the  planters 
themselves  would  be  enabled  to  become  large  customers  for  the  fine  ones  pro- 
duced in  the  North. 

Consuming  more  tea  and  coffee,  the  producers  of  those  articles  would  be 
able  to  purchase  more  cotton,  and  thus  the  planters'  market  would  grow  on 
every  hand.  The  demand  for  machinery,  for  furniture,  and  for  thousands  of 
other  things,  would  produce  new  improvements  in  manufactures,  and  the 
producers  of  tea  and  coffee,  sugar  and  cotton,  would  be  enabled  to  consume 
more  largely  of  them,  while  the  makers  of  machinery  and  furniture  would 
need  more  iron,  more  lumber,  and  more  cotton.* 

•  I  take  the  following  from  The  Cincinnati  Gazette,  as  evidence  of  the  vast  amoun  o. 
smaller  articles,  composed  of  things  that  would  be  wasted,  and  prepared,  much  of  it,  by 
labour  that  would  be  wasted  but  for  the  proximity  of  a  market : — 

"What  our  larger  manufactures  for  the  South  are,  is  well  understood,  especially  by 
persons  familiar  with  the  machinery  of  sugar  plantations.  Our  small  manufactures,  con 
sisting  of  bagging,  buckets,  tubs,  ploughs,  &o.,  are  less  known.  The  exports  of  some  of 
these  ibr  four  seasons,  will  serve  to  show  ooth  the  requirements  of  the  South  in  thi§ 
respect,  and  our  ability  to  supply  them. 


THE    HARMONY"    OF    INTERESTS. 


51 


On  the  other  hand,  let  us  suppose  the  cotton  mills  closed,  and  the  supply 
of  cloth  diminished  to  the  extent  of  all  that  is  produced  from  600,000  bales 
of  cotton — the  furnaces  closed,  and  the  supply  of  iron  diminished  to  the 
extent  of  800,000  tons — and  the  coal  mines  closed,  and  the  supply  of  fuel 
diminished  to  the  extent  of  three  millions  of  tons — could  we  import  and  pay 
for  the  deficiency  ?  Would  the  whole  cotton  crop  then  bring  more  than  we 
now  obtain  for  three-fourths  of  it  ?  It  would  not.  Our  power  to  import 
foreign  cloth  and  iron,  and  fuel,  would  not  only  not  be  increased,  but  it 
would  be  diminished,  and  we  should  consume  one  pound  of  cotton  per  head 
instead  of  ten  or  twelve.  The  power  to  pay  for  all  the  cotton  and  iron  pro- 
duced at  home,  results  from  the  saving  of  labour,  and  with  the  disappear- 
ance of  the  power  to  save  that  labour  would  disappear  the  power  to  consume 
what  are  now  its  products.  Union  between  the  producer  and  the  consumer 
at  home,  would,  therefore,  appear  to  be  more  profitable  than  union  with 
people  abroad  and  disunion  among  those  at  home. 

CHAPTER  FIFTH. 

WHY    IS    IT   THAT    PROTECTION    IS    REQUIRED  ? 

IF  all  the  labour  employed  in  converting  food  and  cotton  into  cloth,  and 
food,  ore,  and  fuel  into  iron,  be  really  saved  labour — if  the  whole  result  be 
really  profit — why  is  it  that  men  should  require  protection  to  enable  them  to 
produce  cloth  and  iron?  The  question  is  a  natural  one, and  should  be  fully 
answered. 

It  is  because  it  is  saved  labour,  and  because  the  loom  and  the  anvil  are 
merely  subsidiary  to  the  plough  and  the  harrow  that  protection  is  required. 
The  first  and  great  object  of  man  is,  to  obtain  food  and  the  materials  of 
clothing  for  himself  and  family.  Neither  is  fit  for  use  in  the  form  in  which 
it  is  yielded  by  the  earth — t"he  great  machine  of  production.  The  grain 
requires  to  be  ground,  and  the  wool  to  be  spun  and  woven.  He  pounds 
the  one  and  his  wife  endeavours  to  convert  the  other  into  cloth  of  some 
description,  however  rude.  They  work  with  bad  machinery,  and  they 
lose  much  time,  and  yet  the  loss  is  less  than  would  be  the  case  were  they 
to  carry  the  grain  to  the  distant  flour-mill,  or  the  wool  to  the  yet  more  distant 
woollens-mill.  By  degrees  population  increases, and  the  blacksmith  comes  to 
exchange  horse-shoes  for  food.  The  carpenter  comes  to  exchange  labour 
for  food.  The  saw-miller  comes  to  exchange  the  labour  of  himself  and.  his 

1846-'46. 
Alcohol,  bbls 1,615 


Brooms,  doz. 
Bagging,  pieces 
Candles,  boxes 
Cooperage,  pieces 
Lard  oil,  bbls. 
Linseed  oil,  bbls. 


1,584 


6,757 

.       18,388 
1,690 
455 

Soap,  boxes      ....        2,708 
Starch,  boxes    .         .         .         .     •    2,499 

White  lead,  kegs 

Sundry  manufactures,  packages'  7,957 
"  These  small  manufactures  are  too  often  overlooked  by  persons  from  abroad  who  sm 
vey  this  populous  city,  and  wonder  how  it  came  and  what  it  is  doing  out  here  in  the 
heart  of  what  was  nothing  but  a  wilderness  half  a  century  ago.  But  they  really  consti- 
tute, as  every  one  familiar  with  them  knows,  one  of  the  main  elements  of  our  prosperity. 
And  behind  them  lie  many  others,  contributing  their  share  to  our  comforts  and  our 
growth,  which  as  yet  enter  only  slightly  into  our  export  trade,  and  consequently  are  not 
included  in  our  commercial  tables." 


1846-'47. 

1847-'48. 

1848-'49. 

1,844 

1,771 

3,022 

5,108 

3,760 

3,333 

8,867 

12,632 

15,910 

16,622 

29,180 

39,640 

41,121 

36,924 

55,617 

6,199 

8,277 

9,550 

6.032 

3,878 

3.020 

10,080 

11,295 

11,308 

5,826 

8,179 

7,904 

. 

.           ; 

29,417 

22,251 

42,418 

94,934 

52  THE    HARMONY   OF    INTERESTS. 

machine  for  food.  In  all  these  cases  we  see  combination  of  action,  and 
with  its  growth  men  obtain  horse-shoes  and  houses  more'  readily  than 
before.  Next  the  little  grist-mill  comes,  and  the  miller  gives  the  labour  of 
grinding  in  exchange  for  food  to  eat.  Again,  the  little  woollens-mill  comes, 
and  the  miller  gives  his  labour  to  the  carpenter  and  saw-miller  for  labour 
and  lumber,  to  the  blacksmith  for  his  iron  work,  and  to  the  farmer  for  food 
and  wool.  Next  the  little  furnace  comes,  and  the  furnace  man,  in  like 
manner,  exchanges  with  his  neighbours,  and  with  the  progress  of  combi- 
nation of  action  men  obtain,  at  every  step,  food,  fuel,  clothing,  iron,  furni 
ture,  and  houses,  with  increased  facility.  The  first  and  great  desire  of  man 
is  that  of  association  with  his  fellow-man,  and  it  is  so,  because  he  feels  that 
improvement  of  his  condition,  physical,  moral,  mental  and  political,  is  its 
uniform  accompaniment. 

Throughout  this  country,  there  is  a  want  of  combination.  Men  are  per- 
petually flying  from  each  other,  scattering  themselves  over  large  surfaces, 
and  wasting  the  labour  that  if  saved  would  make  them  rich.  This  inability 
to  combine  their  exertions  is  the  result  of  artificial  causes;  and  the  adoption 
of  the  protective  system  has  been  produced  by  an  instinctive  effort  to  obtain 
by  its  aid  that  which,  had  those  causes  not  existed,  would  have  come 
naturally  and  without  effort. 

If  we  now  look  to  the  early  history  of  these  provinces,  we  shall  see  the 
gradual  tendency  towards  the  establishment  of  furnaces,  woollen-mills,  &c. 
for  the  purpose  of  enabling  men  to  combine  their  exertions  for  obtaining  iron, 
cloth,  and  other  of  the  necessaries  of  life  with  the  least  loss  of  labour  in  the 
work  of  transportation,  whereby  they  might  be  enabled  to  economize  their 
own  labour  to  be  employed  in  the  work  of  production,  while  their  sons  and 
daughters  were  obtaining  wages  in  the  conversion  of  wool  into  cotton,  or 
ore  into  iron. 

The  object  of  the  colonial  system  was  that  of  "  raising  up  a  nation  of 
customers,"  a  project  "fit  only,"  says  Adam  Smith,  "for  a  nation  of  shop- 
keepers." He  was,  however,  inclined  to  think,  that  even  for  them  it  was 
unfit,  although  "  extremely  fit  for  a  nation  whose  government  was  influenced 
by  shopkeepers."  As  early  as  the  period  immediately  following  the  Revolu- 
tion of  1688,  we  find  the  shopkeeping  influence  exerted  for  the  "dis- 
couragement" of  the  woollens  manufacture  of  Ireland;  and  while  the 
people  of  that  unfortunate  country  were  thus  prevented  from  converting 
their  own  wool  into  cloth,  they  were  by  other  laws  prevented  from  making 
any  exchanges  with  their  fellow-subjects  in  other  colonies,  unless  through 
the  medium  of  English  ports  and  English  "  shopkeepers." 

Such  being  the  case,  it  was  little  likely  that  any  efforts  at  combination  of 
exertion  among  distant  colonists,  for  rendering  labour  more  productive  of 
the  conveniences  and  comforts  of  life,  should  escape  the  jealous  eyes  of  men 
whose  shopkeeping  instincts  had  prompted  them  to  the  adoption  of  such 
measures  in  regard  to  nearer  ones.  The  first  attempt  at  manufacturing 
any  species  of  cloth  in  the  American  provinces  was  followed  by  interfer- 
ence on  the  part  of  the  British  legislature.  In  1710,  the  House  of  Com- 
mons declared,  "  that  the  erecting  of  manufactories  in  the  colonies  had  a 
tendency  to  lessen  their  dependence  upon  Great  Britain."  Soon  afterwards 
complaints  were  made  to  Parliament,  that  the  colonists  were  setting  up 
manufactories  for  themselves,  and  the  House  of  Commons  ordered  the 
Board  of  Trade  to  report  upon  the  subject,  which  was  done  at  great  length. 
In  1732,  the  exportation  of  hnts  from  province  to  province  was  prohibited, 
and  the  number  of  apprentices  to  be  taken  by  hatters  was  limited.  In 
1750,  the  erection  of  any -mill  or  other  engine  for  splitting  or  rolling  iron 
was  prohibited  ;  but  pig-iron  was  allowed  to  be  imported  into  England  duty 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  53 

free,  that  it  might  then  be  manufactured  and  sent  back  again.  At  a  later  pe- 
riod, Lord  Chatham  declared,  that  he  would  not  allow  the  colonists  to  make 
even  a  hob-nail  for  themselves.  Such  is  a  specimen  of  the  system,  with  regard 
to  these  colonies.  That  in  relation  to  the  world  at  large  shall  now  be  given. 

Bythe  act,  SGeorge  III.  £1765,]  the  exportation  of  artisans  was  prohibited 
under  a  heavy  penalty. 

By  that  of  21  George  III.  [1781,]  the  exportation  of  utensils  required  for 
the  manufacture  of  woollens  or  silk  was  likewise  prohibited. 

By  that  of  22  George  III.  [1782,]  the  prohibition  was  extended  to 
artificers  in  printing  calicoes,  cottons,  muslins  or  linens,  or  in  making 
blocks  and  implements  to  be  used  in  their  manufacture. 

By  that  of  25  George  III.  [1785,]  it  was  extended  to  tools  used  in  the 
iron  and  steel  manufactures,  and  to  the  workmen  employed  therein. 

By  that  of  39  George  III.  [1799,]  it  was  extended  to  colliers. 

These  laws  continued  in  full  force  until  the  year  1824,  when  the  prohi- 
bition as  to  the  export  of  artisans  was  abolished,  and  all  those  relating  to 
the  export  of  machinery  so  far  relaxed  that  "  permission  may  now  be  had 
for  the  exportation  of  all  the  more  common  articles  of  machinery,"  discretion 
having  been  given  to  the  Board  of  Trade,  which  decides  upon  each  appli- 
cation, "according  to  the  merits  of  the  case."  But  little  difficulty  is 
now,  it  is  said,  experienced  by  merchants,  who  generally  know  as  to 
what  machines  "the  indulgence  will  be  extended,  and  from  what  it  will 
be  withheld,"  almost  as  certainly  as  if  it  had  been  settled  by  act  of  Parlia- 
ment ;  yet,  it  is  deemed  advantageous  to  have  it  left  discretionary  with  the 
Board,  that  they  may  have  "the  power  of  regulating  the  matter,  according 
to  the  changing  interests  of  commerce."*  Under  this  system,  the  whole 
quantity  of  machinery  exported  in  the  eleven  years,  from  1824  to  1835, 
averaged  but  two  hundred  thousand  pounds  per  annum.! 

We  see  thus,  that  the  whole  legislation  of  Great  Britain,  on  this  subject, 
has  been  directed  to  the  one  great  object  of  preventing  the  people  of  her 
colonies,  and  those  of  independent  nations,  from  obtaining  the  machinery 
necessary  to  enable  them  to  combine  their  exertions  for  the  purpose  of 
obtaining  cloth  or  iron,  and  thus  compelling  them  to  bring  to  her  their  raw 
materials,  that  she  might  convert  them  into  the  forms  that  fitted  them  for 
consumption,  and  then  return  to  the  producers  a  portion  of  them,  burdened 
with  great  cost  for  transportation,  and  heavy  charges  for  the  work  of  con- 
version. We  see,  too,  that  notwithstanding  the  revocation  of  a  part  of  the 
system,  it  is  still  discretionary  with  the  Board  of  Trade,  whether  or  not 
they  will  permit  the  export  of  machinery  of  any  description. 

Had  it  not  been  that  there  was  a  natural  tendency  to  have  the  producer 
of  iron  and  cloth,  and  hats,  to  take  his  place  by  the  side  of  the  producer  of 
food  and  wool,  there  could  never  have  arisen  any  necessity  for  such  laws 
as  those  passed  in  relation  to  Ireland  and  the  colonies,  and  had  that  ten- 
dency not  existed,  the  laws  prohibiting  the  export .  of  machinery  would 
never  have  been  required.  It  did  exist,  and  it  does  everywhere  exist,  and 
.'t  was  for  the  purpose  of  preventing  the  gradual  development  of  a  natural 
state  of  things,  and  bringing  about  an  unnatural  one,  whereby  Great  Britain 
might  be  made  "the  work-shop  of  the  world,"  that  those  laws  were  passed. 
The  object  of  protection  has  been,  and  is,  to  restore  the  natural  one. 

The  effect  of  those  laws  has  been  that  of  bringing  about  an  unnatural 
division  of  her  population.  The  loom  and  the  anvil,  in  that  country,  instead  of 
being  second  to  the  plough,  have  become  first,  with  great  deterioration  in 

•  Porter's  Progress  of  the  Nation,  Vol.  I.  p.  320. 
flhjd.  p.  323. 


54  THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 

the  condition  of  both  labourer  and  capitalist.  For  a  long  period,  (bo  :Vw 
engaged  in  manufactures  made  vast  fortunes;  while  the  owners  of  land 
were  enabled  to  obtain  enormous  rents,  because  the  consumers  of  food 
increased  more  rapidly  than  the  producers  of  food.  Land  gradually  con- 
solidated itself  in  fewer  hands,  and  the  little  occupant  of  a  few  acres 
gradually  gave  way  to  the  great  farmer,  who  cultivated  hundreds  of  acres 
by  aid  of  hired-labour.  The  few  became  richer,  and  the  many  went  to  the 
poor-house.  The  value  of  labour,  in  food,  was  diminished,  and  the  value 
of  capital  was  also  diminished,  because  both  were,  as  they  still  are,  shut 
out  from  employment  on  land,  the  only  employment  in  which  both  can  be 
used  to  an  indefinite  extent,  with  constant  increase  in  the  return  to  labour. 

By  degrees,  however,  machinery  was  smuggled  out  of  England,  and 
artisans  escaped  therefrom  ;  and  at  length  there  arose  a  necessity  for  le'galiz- 
ing  the  export  of  both,  and  from  that  time  it  is  that  manufactures  on  the 
continent  of  Europe  have  made  great  progress.  The  people  there,  however, 
have,  like  ourselves,  laboured  under  great  disadvantages.  England  had  mono- 
polized machinery  for  so  long  a  time  that  she  had  acquired  skill  that  could  not 
readily*  be  rivalled  ;  while  she  had,  by  this  improper  division  of  her  popula- 
tion, kept  the  price  of  labour  and  capital  at  a  lower  point — proportioned  to 
the  advantage  with  which  they  might  have  been  applied — than  among  her 
neighbours.  Her  establishments  were  gigantic,  and  always  ready  to  sink 
those  who  might  undertake  competition;  while  the  unceasing  changes  in 
her  monetary  arrangements,  the  necessary  consequences  of  the  colonial 
system,  were  of  themselves  sufficient  to  spread  ruin  among  all  the  nations 
connected  with  her.  Our  own  experience  has  been  that  of  all  the  world. 

The  necessary  consequence  of  the  existence  of  such  a  state  of  things, 
was  resistance  by  the  various  independent  nations  of  the  world,  in  the  form 
of  tariffs  of  protection ;  one  of  the  first  results  of  which  was  the  modification  of 
the  law  prohibiting  the  export  of  machinery.  From  that  period  to  the 
present,  she  has  been  engaged  in  an  effort  to  under-work  other  nations, 
despite  their  efforts  to  shutx  her  out,  and  with  each  stage  of  her  progress 
the  condition  of  her  operatives,  as  well  as  that  of  her  farm  labourers,  has 
deteriorated.  Women  have  been  substituted  for  men,  and  children  of  the 
most  immature  years  for  women,  and  the  hours  of  labour  have  been  so  far 
extended  as  to  render  Parliamentary  interference  absolutely  necessary. 
That  interference  was  opposed,  on  the  ground  that  all  the  profit  of  the 
machinery  resulted  from  the  running  of  an  additional  hour.  In  the  mining 
department  of  her  trade,  the  system  is  the  same,  and  it  is  impossible  to 
read  the  Parliamentary  Reports  on  the  condition  of  her  manufacturing  and 
mining  labourers,  without  being  horrified  at  the  awful  consequences  that 
have  resulted  from  this  effort  to  tax  the  world  by  monopolizing  machinery. 
The  moral  effects  are  as  bad  as  the  physical  ones.  Frauds  of  every 
kind  have  become  almost  universal.  Flour  is  substituted  for  cotton,  in  the 
making  up  of  cotton  cloths,  to  such  an  extent  that,  fifteen  years  since,  the 
consumption  for  this  purpose  was  estimated  at  forty-two  millions  of 
pounds.*  The  quality  of  iron,  and  of  all  other  commodities,  is  uniformly 
reduced  to  the  point  that  is  required  for  preventing  other  nations  from  pro- 
ducing such  commodities  for  themselves. 

By  the  census  of  1831,  it  was  shown  that  the  number  of  families  in  England 
and  Wales  was  3,303,504,  of  which  1,170,000  were  those  of  agricultural 
occupants,  or  of  agricultural  and  mining  labourers,  producers  of  things  to  be 

•  *«  These  goods  are  generally  smoother  and  more  evenly  made  than  Amei  lean  fabrics 
of  the  same  cost ;  but  they  must  be  used  in  their  dry  state,  as  in  washing  their  appearano 
M  very  much  changed." — Dry  Goods  Reporter,  Nov.  1849. 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  55 


converted  or  exchanged ;  leaving  2,133,000  for  the  converters  and  ex- 
changers, and  for  the  money-spending  classes — paupers  on  one  hand,  and 
state  annuitants,  noblemen  and  gentlemen, on  the  other.  Thus  the  products 
of  one  labourer  had  to  be  divided  among  three. 

By  the  census  of  1841,  it  was  shown  that,  notwithstanding  an  increase  in 
the  last  ten  years  of  630,000  in  the  number  of  adult  males,  there  had  been 
an  actual  diminution  of  19,000  in  the  number  employed  in  agriculture,  and 
thus  we  have  almost  four  persons  to  consume  the  products  of  one. 

Since  that  date,  the  tendency  has  been  in  the  same  direction.  The 
transporters,  converters,  and  exchangers  have  been  steadily  and  rapidly  in- 
creasing in  their  proportion  to  the  producers. 

With  each  step  in  her  progress,  she  thus  becomes  less  a  producer,  and 
more  and  more  a  mere  exchanger,  dependent  upon  the  profits  of  converting 
and  exchanging  the  products  of  other  nations.  This  steadily  increasing 
disproportion  between  the  producers  and  the  exchangers,  brought  about  the 
state  of  things  that  led  to  the  repeal  of  the  corn  laws,  since  the  date  of  which 
there  is  an  evident  increase  in  the  tendency  to  become  a  mere  exchanger  of 
the  works  of  other  men's  hands.  The  amount  of  her  trade  does  not  grow 
with  the  growth  required  by  this  change.  The  farmer  may  live  and  main- 
tain his  family  out  of  a  crop  of  five  hundred  bushels,  or  even  less.  The 
shopkeeper,  to  live  as  well,  must  pass  through  his  hands  five  thousand 
bushels ;  and  what  is  true  of  the  individual  shopkeeper  is  equally  true  of  a 
nation  of  shopkeepers,  as  I  will  now  show. 

The  man  who  raises  his  own  food,  and  sells  of  it  to  the  amount  of  $100, 
has  that  sum  to  be  applied  to  the  purchase  of  clothing  and  other  of  the  com- 
forts of  life.  He  is  selling  the  product  of  his  own  labour. 

The  man  who  buys  food  to  the  extent  of  $100,  and  sells  his  products  for 
8200,  has  but  $100  to  be  applied  to  the  purchase  of  other  things  than  food. 
To  the  extent  of  one-half  he  is  selling  the  produce  of  the  labour  of  others. 

The  man  who  buys  food  and  leather,  each  to  the  extent  of  $100,  must  sell 
$300  worth  of  shoes  to  give  him  $100  to  be  applied  to  the  purchase  of  other 
things  than  food.  To  the  extent  of  two-thirds  he  is  selling  the  labour  of 
others. 

So  is  it  with  nations.  When  they  sell  their  own  products,  their  power 
to  purchase  from  others  is  equal  to  the  whole  amount  sold.  WThen  they 
sell  the  products  of  others,  whether  in  the  same  or  any  other  form,  their 
power  of  purchase  is  only  to  the  extent  of  the  difference  between  the  price 
paid  and  the  price  received.  The  bale  of  cotton  exported  as  yarn,  is  but  the 
bale  imported  as  wool,  and,  to  the  extent  of  the  cost  of  the  wool,  represents 
no  part  of  the  power  to  purchase  for  consumption.  The  barrel  of  American 
flour  exported  in  the  form  of  cloth  or  iron,  is  but  the  barrel  of  flour  imported, 
and  represents  no  part  of  the  power  to  purchase  coffee,  tea,  or  sugar. 

The  actual  or  declared  value  of  the  exports  of  the  produce  and  manu- 
factures of  Great  Britain  and  Ireland,  was, 

From  1815  to  1819,  annual  average,    .        .     ^44,000,000 
«     1827  to  1834,     "  "           .  38,000,000 

"     1845  to  1848,      «          «          .  60,500,000 

From  these  sums  is  to  be  deducted,  in  all  cases,  the  cost  of  the  raw  material 
required  to  produce  the  commodities  exported. 

The  quantity  of  cotton  manufactured  in  the  first  period  amounted  to 
100,000,000  of  pounds  per  annum,  and  the  average  price  was  19  pence,* 

•  McCulloch's  Com.  Diet.,  art.  Cotton. 


56  THE    HARMONY    OF   INTERESTS. 

making  the  whole  cost  about  £8,000,000.  The  value  of  cotton  goods 
exported  was  £16,500,000,  of  which  the  raw  material  may  have  been  about 
£6,500,000. 

The  consumption  of  foreign  wool  was  about  7,000,000  of  pounds  weight, 
and  with  this  exception  the  whole  amount  of  the  export  was  of  domestic 
production. 

The  import  of  food  amounted  to  about  1,500,000  quarters,  or  13,500,00< 
bushels  of  60  pounds  weight. 

Putting  together  all  the  foreign  food  and  raw  materials  required  for  the 
product  of  £44,000,000  of  exports,  the  total  cost  could  scarcely  have  ex- 
ceeded £12,000,000,  leaving  £32,000,000  as  the  value  of  domestic  pro- 
ducts and  labour  exported  by  a  population  of  21,000,000,  being  equal  to 
about  £MO  per  head,  or  $7*20,  to  be  applied  to  the  purchase  of  foreign 
commodities  for  domestic  consumption. 

In  the  second  period,  the  quantity  of  cotton  manufactured  averaged  about 
275,000,000  of  pounds,  and  the  price  had  fallen  to  about  Sd.,  making  the 
cost  about  £9,000,000.  The  proportion  exported  had  somewhat  increased, 
judging  from  the  difference  between  the  quantity  as  given  by  the  official 
value,  and  the  product  as  given  by  the  declared  value,  and  the  amount 
of  labour  had  decreased,  the  exports  of  mere  yarn  having  risen  from 
£1,200,000  to  between  four  and  five  millions.  The  value  of  the  raw  cotton 
thus  exported  may  have  been  £6,000,000. 

The  quantity  of  foreign  wool  retained  for  home  consumption  had  risen  to 
30,000,000  of  pounds,  being  an  important  portion  of  the  quantity  exported 
in  the  form  of  cloth. 

The  average  import  of  food  was,  as  before  about  1,500,000  quarters. 
If,  now,  we  estimate  the  total  consumption  of  food  and  other  raw  materials 
at  £14,000,000,  and  deduct  that  sum  from  the  amount  of  exports,  we  shall 
have  remaining  £24,000,000  as  the  value  of  the  products  and  labour  ex- 
ported by  a  population  of  23,000,000,  being  about  21s.  or  $5  per  head,  ta  be 
appropriated  to  the  purch'ase  of  foreign  commodities,  other  than  grain,  for 
consumption. 

In  the  third  period,  the  declared  value  of  cotton  goods  exported  had  risen 
to  about  £25,000,000,  and  the  cost  of  the  raw  cotton  required  for  this  pur- 
pose, in  the  year  1846,  was  estimated  at  about,        .      £8,500,000 
And  in  the  year  1847,  at     .         .         .         .        8,800,000 
For  1845  and  1848,  the  average  was  about  .        7,350,000 
making  a  total  average  of  £8,000,000.     To  this  must  now  be  added,  the 
wool  of  Australia,  Spain  and  Germany,  of  which  the  manufacture  had  risen 
to  70,000,000  of  pounds  ;  the  silks  of  Italy  and  China;  the  hides,  the  in- 
digo and  other  colouring  materials,  the  gold,  and  innumerable  other  articles 
used  in  the  production  of  this  large  amount  of  manufactures  ;  and  I  shall  be 
safe  in  putting  the  whole  amount,  for  those  years,  at  not  less  than  £14,000,000, 
and  it  is  probably  much  more. 

The  import  of  flour  and  grain  averaged  about  6,250,000 
quarters,  and  as  the  last  of  those  years  amounted  to  about 
five  and  a  half  millions,  it  may  be  safe  to  assume  that  /the 
average  quantity  required  will  not  fall  materially  short  of  six 
millions,  equal  to  fifty-four  millions  of  bushels  of  sixty  pounds 
each,  and  if  the  cost  of  these  be  averaged  at  4s.  per  bushel,  the 
amount  will  be  ." £10,800,000* 

•  The  amount  actually  expended  in  fifteen  months  is  stated  to  have  been  £33,000,000. 
This,  however,  was  an  exceptional  case,  and  my  object  is  rather  to  show  from  the  past 
what  may  lie  taken  as  an  average  of  future  years. 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  57 

If,  now,  we  add  for  vast  quantities  of  live-stock,  pork, 
Leef,  lard,  butter,  cheese,  and  other  articles  of  food,  the  whole 
consumption  of  which  was  formerly  supplied  at  home,  only  1,000,000 

We  shall  have  a  total  of 25,800,000 

To  be  deducted  from  the  gross  amount  of  exports,  and 

leaving  only 24,700,000 

as  the  value  of  the  export  of  the  products  and  labour  of  the  twenty-seven 
and  a  half  millions  composing  the  population  of  the  United  Kingdom,  being 
about  18s.  or  $4-32  per  head,  to  be  applied  to  the  purchase  of  sugar,  tea, 
coffee,  rice,  spices,  and  numerous  other  foreign  articles  of  food — for  lumber, 
tobacco,  foreign  manufactures  of  every  description,  and  for  the  purchase  of 
the  cotton,  silk,  wool,  dye-stuffs,  hides,  &c.  &c.,  required  for  the  manu- 
facture of  clothing  used  at  home. 

We  have  here  a  constantly  diminishing  quantity  to  be  applied  to  the  pur- 
chase of  various  descriptions  of  food  that  from  luxuries  have  become  neces- 
saries of  life,  and  that  of  the  materials  of  clothing.  It  follows,  of  course, 
that  as  food  is  the  article  of  prime  necessity,  the  amount  that  each  ex- 
pends of  clothing  is  very  small  indeed  ;  the  consequence  of  which  is,  that  the 
people  of  England,  engaged  in  furnishing  cheap  clothing  to  all  the  world, 
are  not  only  badly  fed  but  exceedingly  badly  clothed,  the  cost  of  clothing,  in 
labour,  being  so  great  as  to  place  it  beyond  their  reach,*  the  amount'  .that 
can  be  expended  for  that  purpose  tending  rather  to  decrease.  Whenever  a 
good  crop  causes  a  large  quantity  of  cotton  to  come  to  market,  the  price 
falls  to  the  point  that  is  necessary  to  enable  the  purchaser  at  home  to  ab- 
sorb the  surplus  that  cannot  be  exported ;  and  when  the  crop  is  short,  the 
consumption  is  limited  to  the  quantity  that  can  be  purchased  by  the  small 
amount  to  be  expended.  The  whole  sum  now  applicable  to  this  purpose 
appears  not  to  vary  greatly  from  2s.  per  head,  sufficient  to  purchase  three 
pounds  at  Sd.,  or  six  pounds  at  4rf.  This  will  be  seen  by  an  examination 
of  the  following  table : — 


*  By  reference  to  the  report  of  the  Assistant  Commfssioner  charged  with  the  inquiry 
into  the  condition  of  women  and  children  employed  in  agriculture,  it  will  be  seen  that  a 
change  of  clothes  seems  to  be  out  of  the  question.  The  upper  parts  of  the  under-clothes 
of  women  at  work,  even  their  stays,  quickly  become  wet  with  perspiration,  while  the 
lower  parts  cannot  escape  getting  equally  wet  in  nearly  every  kind  of  work  in  which 
they  are  employed,  except  in  the  driest  weather.  It  not  unfrequently  happens  that  a 
woman,  on  returning  from  work,  is  obliged  to  go  to  bed  for  an  hour  or  two  to  allow  her 
clothes  to  be  dried.  It  is  also  by  no  means  uncommon  for  her,  if  she  does  not  do  this,  to 
put  .them  on  again  the  next  morning  nearly  as  wet  as  when  she  took  them  off. 

The  evidence  laid  before  Parliament  in  regard  to  the  situation  of  the  operatives  in 
coal  mines,  showed  that  men  and  women,  boys  and  girls,  were  accustomed  to  work  to- 
gether in  a  state  of  absolute  and  entire  nudity. 

The  slowness  with  which  the  power  of  consuming  other  articles  than  clothing  has 
grown  is  remarkable. 

In  1803,  that  of  paper  was  .  31,699,537  pounds. 

1841,  with  almost  double  the  population,  only          .         .         97,103,548       « 

The  great  diminution  in  the  cost  of  cotton  and  linen  cloth  had  been  attended  with  a 
corresponding  reduction  in  the  cost  of  rags,  while  there  had  been  great  improvements  in 
the  mode  of  manufacture.  The  quantity  of  labour  that  could  be  exchanged  against  paper 
had  evidently  diminished. 

The  consumption  of  candles  in  1801,  was    ....         66,999,080  pounds. 
In  1830  it  was     . 116,851,305       - 

having  little  more  than  kept  pace  with  the  population. 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 

Average  cost  of  Cotton  in  England. 
d. 

1845             .    4| 
1846             .    5           . 
1847     .        .    6| 

1848     .        .    41      '    . 

Home  consumption. 

170  millions 
155        " 
80 
170 

Money  price,  per  head 
s.    d. 
.     about    2     4£ 
"       2    3 
«       1     7 
"23 

We  see,  thus,  that  she  clothes  her  people  at  the  cost  of  the  cotton  planter. 
She  has  a  certain  quantity  of  labour  that  she  can  give  in  exchange  for 
cotton,  and  the  price  of  the  whole  import  is  regulated  thereby.  If  the  crop  is 
large,  she  takes  a  great  deal  for  the  money;  if  it  is  small,  she  takes  but 
little  ;  and  thus  the  producer  not  only  derives  no  benefit  from  large  crops,  but 
is  so  much  injured  thereby,  that  it  is  actually  more  profitable  to  have  one  of 
2,000,000  of  bales,  than  one  of  2,700,000.  Had  that  of  the  present  year 
reached  three  millions,  he  would  have  been  ruined,  for  freights  would  have 
been  h.gu,  while  pices  abroad  would  ha\o  fallen  to  a  lower  point  than  has 
ever  yet  been  reached. 

Instead  of  applying  her  labour  to  the  cultivation  of  her  own  soil,  she  pur- 
sues a  course  having  for  its  object  that  of  compelling  all  the  farmers  and 
planters  of  the  world  to  make  their  exchanges  in  her  markets,  where  she  fixes 
the  price  for  the  world.  Her  power  to  apply  the  proceeds  of  labour  to  the 
purchase  of  other  commodities  than  those  of  prime  necessity  is  small,  and 
gradually  but  steadily  diminishing;  and  whenever  the  labours  of  the  pro- 
ducer are  rewarded  with  liberal  returns,  he  is  nearly  ruined,  because  the 
price  falls  below  the  cost  of  production. 

The  system  is  altogether  so  remarkable  that  at  some  future  day  it  will  be 
deemed  almost  impossible  that  it  should  ever  have  been  tolerated.  She  has 
a  certain  quantity  of  the  means  of  transportation  and  con  version,  and  being  thus 
provided  she  desires  that  all  the  cotton  and  sheep's-wool  of  the  world  shall 
be  brought  to  her,  that  it  may  be  spun  and  woven,  and  that  she  may  take 
toll  for  spinning  and  weaving  it.  The  more  that  is  brought  to  her  the  less 
of  it  she  gives  back  to  the  producer,  and  the  price  she  pays  him  fixes  the 
price  he  receives  from  all  the  world.  How  the  system  works  may  be  seen 
from  the  following  statement : — 

1815  to  1819.         1827-1834.  1845-1846. 

Cotton  consumed,  Ibs.   .         .         .         100,000,000     275,000,000     596.000,000 

Value £8,000,000*        9,000,000       11,400,000 

She  pays  for  this  in  cotton-cloth  and  iron,  the  prices  of  which,  at  these 
periods  were  as  follows : — 

A  piece  of  calico,  of  24  yards         .         .         16/6*  7/6f  6/7 

A  ton  of  merchant-bar  iron  .         .         £11*  £75  £9  10 

Had  the  whole  been  paid  in  these,  the  planter  would  have  received  of 

Clotb,  pieces 9,700,000       24,000,000       34,700,000 

Or  iron,  tons 730,000         1,250,000         1,200,000 

The  additional  freight,  home  and  foreign,  charges,  commissions,  &c.,  in 
tne  last  period  were,  at  three  cents  per  pound,  on  496,000,000  of  pounds, 
say  $15,000,000.  For  this  the  planter  would  receive,  in  Liverpool,  470,000 
additional  tons  of  iron,  the  value  of  which,  in  Liverpool,  at  the  present 
moment,  would  be  about  $11,000,000,  and  thus  he  not  only  gave  away  his 
cotton,  but  gave  with  it  a  large  portion  of  the  cost  of  transportation.  The  whole 
return  to  him  for  600,000,000  was  not  as  great  as  it  had  been  to  100,000,000. 
It  thus  appears  that  notwithstanding  all  the  improvements  in  manufacture, 
the  planter  had  to  give  in  the  last  period  six  times  the  quantity  of  cotton  to 

•  McCullocb's  Statistics,  Vol.  II.  p.  70. 

fThis  is  the  average  of  the  years  from  1831  to  1834,  as  given  in  Burns's  Commercial 
Glance,  and  copied  in  the  Merchants'  Magazine,  Vol.  XIX.  p.  277. 

*  Average  of  1817  to  1819— Merchants'  Magazine,  Vol.  XX.  p.  337. 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  53 

obtain  three  and  a  half  times  the  cloth  that  he  could  have  had  in  the  first — . 
and  six  times  the  quantity  to  obtain  a  smaller  quantity  of  iron.  A  more* 
admirable  mode  of  taxing  the  world  was  certainly  never  devised. 

The  result  of  the  system  is,  that  the  productiveness  of  agricultural  labour 
is  declining  in  every  portion  of  the  world  that  does  not  protect  itself  against 
this  "  war  upon  labour  and  capital,"  as  I  will  now  show. 

Consumption  is  measured  by  production.  Every  man  is  a  consumer  to 
the  whole  extent  of  his  production.  To  that  point  he  will  go,  and  beyond 
it  he  cannot  go.  The  first  of  his  wants  is  food  ;  next  comes  clothing ;  after 
this  follow  the  conveniences  and  luxuries  of  life.  If  his  productive  power 
increases,  his  power  to  obtain  clothing  increases  rapidly,  because  the  whole 
surplus  is  applicable  to  other  things  than  food.  If  it  diminishes,  his  power 
to  obtain  clothing  diminishes  with  great  rapidity,  for  food  he  must  have.  That 
it  has  diminished,  and  is  now  diminishing  rapidly,  will,  I  think,  be  evident 
from  the  following  facts  : — 

Sixty  years  since,  the  price  paid  by  the  consumers  of  cotton  to  the  pro- 
ducers of  it  was  estimated  at  $40,000,000. 

From  1827  to  1834,  both  inclusive,  the  crops  of  the  United  States  ave- 
raged 945,000  bales,  and  the  home  consumption  about  145,000,  leaving 
800,000  for  export.  The  average  price  was  about  $40  per  bale,  and  the 
product  $32,000,000. 

In  this  period,  India  continued  to  produce  extensively  of  cotton,  and  to 
manufacture  cotton  goods.  The  China  market  was  not  opened  to  the 
free  traders  until  1831,  and  it  required  some  time  to  substitute  the  cotton 
cloth  of  England  for  the  cotton  and  cloth  of  India.  With  every  day  that  has 
since  elapsed,  the  production  of  cotton  has  declined,  as  the  manufacture  has 
been  passing  towards  annihilation.  Cotton  was  then  extensively  raised  in 
the  West  Indies,  Brazil,  Egypt,  Africa,  Mexico,  and  elsewhere ;  and  the 
total  product,  exclusive  of  that  of  the  United  States,  was  estimated  at 
450,000,000  of  pounds,  or  about  one-fifth  more  than  that  of  the  Union. 
Averaging  .the  whole  at  the  same  price,  we  should  now  obtain  an  annual 
expenditure,  excluding  our  own, /or  cotton  wool,  of  $76,000,000. 

From  1842  to  1848,  both  inclusive,  the  crop  averaged  2,080,000  bales, 
and  the  home  consumption  about  400,000,  leaving  1,660,000  for  export. 
Two  hundred  thousand  of  these  may  be  given  to  the  Zoll-verein,  and 
other  countries  of  Europe  that  have  protected  themselves  against  the  system, 
not  as  the  increased  quantity  actually  taken  under  low  prices,  but  as  that 
which  would  have  gone  at  high  ones,  leaving  1,460,000  for  the  quantity 
that  may  be  supposed  to  be  influenced  by  the  system.  The  average  price, 
during  that  period,  was  seven  and  a  half  cents,  or  $34  per  bale,  and  the 
average  product  of  the  portion  of  the  crop  thus  exported,  $50,000,000. 

Since  then,  the  cultivator  of  this  most  important  commodity,  throughout 
the  world,  has  been  ruined,  and  it  is  greatly  to  be  doubted  if  the  whole  pro- 
duction, outside  of  the  Union,  is  now  more  than  one  half  of  what  it  was  thirty 
years  since;  but,  at  the  utmost,  it  cannot  exceed  270,000,000;  and  if  we 
now  assume  that  quantity,  and,  as  before,  put  the  whole  al;the  same  price, 
we  shall  obtain,  as  the  amount  paid  for  cotton,  by  almost  the  whole  population 
of  the  world,  outside  of  the  Union,  as  follows  : — 

For  the  crop  of  this  country,  .         .         $50,000,000 

For  that  of  the  rest  of  the  world,        .         .          20,000,000 


$70,000,000 

Showing  a  large  reduction,  notwithstanding  the  increase  in  the  number  of< 
persons  employed  in  its  production,  and  the  increase  of  those  who  should 
consume  it,  and  yet  the  case,  as  here  stated,  does  not  represent  the  real 


60  THE    HABMONY    OF   INTERESTS. 

diminution  in  the  amount  paid  to  the  producers.  Of  the  cotton  of  India, 
nearly  the  whole  value  is  now  swallowed  up  in  freights,  and  while  the  cost 
to  the  consumer  is  large,  the  yield  to  the  producer  is  scarcely  more  than  two 
cents  per  pound.  A  more  full  examination  of  the  subject  would,  I  believe, 
result  in  showing  that  the  producers  of  cotton,  taken  as  a  body,  do  not  re- 
ceive in  return  for  all  the  clothing  material  that  has  to  so  great  an  extent 
superseded  wool,  flax,  &c.,  from  the  people  of  the  world  outside  of.  the 
limits  of  the  Union,  twenty  millions  of  dollars  more  than  they  did  sixty 
years  since. 

A  similar  examination  of  the  movement  in  regard  to  sugar,  coffee,  wool,  and 
other  articles,  would  yield  the  same  results,  for  the  exhaustion  is  every- 
where the  same.  The  whole  effect  of  the  system  is  that  of  reducing 
the  farmer  and  the  planter — the  producers  of  the  good  things  of  the  world — 
to  the  condition  of  an  humble  dependence  upon  the  owners  of  a  quantity  of 
small  machinery  for  the  conversion  of  wool  into  cloth,  that  they  themselves 
could  purchase  at  the  cost  of  less  labour  than,  for  want  of  it,  they  Avaste 
in  each  and  every  year. 

Let  us  now  look  to  the  results,  as  exhibited  in  the  immediate  dependencies 
of  England. 

With  this  vast  increase  in  the  importation  of  food  from  abroad  has  come 
the  ruin  of  the  people  of  Ireland.  Deprived  of  manufactures  and  commerce, 
her  people  were  driven  to  live  by  agriculture  alone,  and  she  was  enabled  to 
drag  on  a  miserable  existence,  so  long  as  her  neighbour  was  content  to  make 
some  compensation  for  the  loss  of  labour  by  paying  her  for  her  products 
higher  prices  than  those  at  which  they  might  have  been  elsewhere  pur- 
chased. With  the  repeal  of  the  corn  laws,  that  resource  has  failed  ;  and 
the  result  is  a  state  of  poverty,  wretchedness,  and  famine,  that  has  compelled 
the  establishment  of  a  system  which  obliges  the  landowner  to  maintain  the 
people,  whether  they  work  or  not ;  and  thus  is  one  of  the  conditions  of  slavery 
re-established  in  that  unhappy  country.  From  being  a  great  exporter  of 
food,  she  has  now  become  a  large  importer.  The  great  market  for  Indian 
corn  is  Ireland — a  country  in  which  the  production  of  food  is  almost  the  sole 
occupation  of  the  people.  The  value  of  labour  in  food,  throughout  a  popula- 
tion of  eight  millions,  is  thus  rapidly  decreasing. 

From  an  inquiry  instituted  by  Lord  Clarendon,  in  1847,  and  conducted 
in  the  most  careful  manner,  it  was  ascertained  that  out  of  20,800,000  acres 
of  which  the  kingdom  consists,  there  were  but  5,200,000  under  crop,  and 
that  the  yield  of  cereal  grains,  chiefly  oats,  averaged  10  bushels  (of  70 
pounds)  per  head,  while  that  of  potatoes  was  561  pounds  per  head.  The 
cattle  amounted  to  2,591,000,  or  less  than  one  to  three  persons  of  the  popula- 
tion; the  hogs  to  622,000,  or  one  to  thirteen  ;  and  the  sheep  to  2,186,177, 
or  one  to  four.  Such  are  the  products  of  a  nation,  exclusively  agricultural, 
whose  numbers  were  about  one-half  those  of  the  people  of  the  Union,  at 
our  last  census. 

Were  it  possible  now  to  ascertain  the  quantity  of  food,  per  head,  produced 
in  Great  Britain  and  Ireland,  it  is  probable  that  it  would  be  found  to  be  less 
than  it  was  five  years  since,  and  that  the  whole  quantity,  foreign  and  do- 
mestic, was  not  materially  greater  than  at  that  date.  If  so,  it  follows  that 
the  whole  amount  of  labour  expended  in  purchasing  and  fashioning  the 
cotton  of  other  lands  to  be  given  in  exchange  for  food,  is  lost  labour,  and  that 
the  average  quantity  of  food  and  of  other  commodities  obtainable  throughout 
the  kingdom  in  return  for  any  given  quantity,  tends  downwards  instead  of 
upwards  ;  and  that  such  is  the  case  there  is  reason  to  believe.  As  evidence 
that  such  is  the  fact,  we  may  take  the  expenditure  for  support  of  paupers, 
which  in  1837  was  £4,207,000,  and  for  1844,  5,  and  6,  averaged  ^,890,000, 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  61 

being  an  increase  of  forty  per  cent,  in  eight  years.  In  1848,  it  had  attained 
the  enormous  height  of  £7,800,000.  If  now  to  this  we  were  to  add  the 
expenditure  for  the  same  purpose  in  Ireland,  we  should  find  the  growth  to 
be  absolutely  terrific. 

As  a  full  answer  to  this,  the  English  economist  would  point  to  the  in- 
creased consumption  of  certain  commodities  ;  but  that  increase  is  maintained, 
as  we  have  seen,  by  the  oppression  and  ruin  of  the  agriculturist  every- 
where. The  whole  system  has  for  its  object  an  increase  in  the  number  of 
persons  that  are  to  intervene  between  the  producer  and  the  consumer — 
living  on  the  product  of  the  land  and  labour  of  others,  diminishing  the 
power  of  the  first,  and  increasing  the  number  of  the  last;  and  thus  it  is 
that  Ireland  is  compelled  to  waste  more  labour  annually  than  would  be  re- 
quired to  produce,  thrice  over,  all  the  iron,  and  convert  into  cloth  all  the  cotton 
and  wool  manufactured  in  England.  The  poverty  of  producers  exists 
nearly  in  the  ratio  in  which  they  are  compelled  to  make  their  exchanges  in 
the  market  of  Great  Britain,  foregoing  the  advantages  that  would  result  to 
them  from  the  free  exercise  of  the  power  of  associating  for  the  purpose 
of  combining  their  exertions,  and  thus  rendering  their  labour  more  effective. 

The  manufacturers  of  India  have  been  ruined,  and  that  great  country  is 
gradually  and  certainly  deteriorating  and  becoming  depopulated,  to  the  sur- 
prise of  those  of  the  people  of  England  who  are  familiar  with  its  vast 
advantages,  and  who  do  not  understand  the  destructive  character  of  their 
own  system.  The  London  Economist  says  : — 

'•  Looking  to  our  Indian  empire,  we  cannot  but  be  struck  with  the  singular  facilities 
which — in  climate,  soil,  and  population — it  presents  to  the  commerce  of  Great  Britain.  At 
first  sight,  it  seems  to  offer  every  thing  that  could  be  devised,  in  order  to  induce  to  a  com- 
mercial intercourse  almost  without  limit.  There  is  scarcely  one  important  article  of  tro- 
pical produce  which  is  consumed  in  this  country,  either  as  the  raw  material  of  our  manu- 
factures,  or  as  an  article  of  daily  use,  for  the  production  of  which  India  is  not  as  well,  or 
better,  adapted  than  any  other  country  •  while  its  dense  and  industrious  population  would 
seem  to  offer  an  illimitable  demand  for  our  manufactures.  Nor  are  there  opposed  to 
Jliese  natural  and  flattering  elements  of  commerce  any  fiscal  restrictions  to  counteract  their 
beneficial  results.  Indian  produce  has  long  entered  into  consumption  in  the  home 
markets  on  the  most  favourable  terms;  while,  in  the  introduction  of  British  manufactures 
into  India,  a  very  moderate  duty  is  imposed.  Yet,  notwithstanding  all  these  advantages, 
it  is  a  notorious  fact,  deducible  alike  from  the  tendency  which  the  supply  of  some  of  the 
mqst  important  articles  of  Indian  produce  show  to  fall  off,  and  from  the  stagnant,  or  rather 
declining,  state  of  the  export  of  our  manufactures  to  those  markets — and,  perhaps,  still 
more  so,  from  the  extremely  unprofitable  and  unsatisfactory  result  which  has  attended 
both  the  export  and  import  trade  with  India  for  some  time  past, — that  there  exist  some 
great  and  serious  impediments  to  the  realization  of  the  just  and  fair  hopes  entertained 
with  regard  to  our  Indian  trade." 

Another  writer*  speaks  of  it  as  a  country  whose  exports  are  rapidly 
diminishing.  Sugar,  he  says,  does  not  increase,  while  indigo  decreases, 
and  cotton  is  reduced  one-third  to  one-half.  The  revenue  is*  deficient. 
Gazerat  and  Cutch,  which  once  supplied  cotton  to  half  the  world,  have 
almost  ceased  to  produce  it.  The  growth  and  manufacture  of  cotton  have 
disappeared  from  Bengal,  which  once  gave  to  the  world  the  Dacca  muslins, 
the  finest  in  the  world.  Cotton  fields  have  everywhere  relapsed  into 
jungle. 

Year  after  year  we  are  told  of  efforts  being  made  to  increase  the  pro- 
duct and  improve  the  quality  of  India  cotton,  and  yet  year  after  year  the 
prospect  of  improvement  becomes  more  remote,  and  necessarily  so,  because 
agricultural  improvement  under  the  existing  impoverishing  system  is  im- 

•  London  correspondent  of  the  National  Intelligencer. 


62  THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 

possible.  For  a  short  period,  premiums  were  granted  on  what  is  called 
free  sugar — to  wit,  that  raised  by  the  wretched  Hindoo  who  perishes  of 
starvation,  the  consequence  of  the  system — and  while  that  policy  was  main- 
tained its  cultivation  made  some  progress,  but  since  the  abolition  of  the  re- 
strictions on  slave-grown  sugar,  every  thing  tends  downward.* 

Ireland  and  India  are  thus  in  the  same  condition.  The  West  Indies  are 
ruined,  and  Canada,  Nova  Scotia,  and  New  Brunswick,  now  seek  annexa- 
tion, that  they  may  have  protection  from  a  system  under  which  they  are 
being  ruined.  The  owner  of  land,  everywhere,  knows  that  it  would  be 
doubled  by  the  change,  and  the  labourer  transfers  himself  to  the  south  of 
the  boundary-line,  that  he  may  find  employment  and  good  wages,  which 
cannot  be  found  at  the  north  of  it. '  Those  who  remain  north  of  it  now 
anxiously  seek  for  admission  for  their  grain,  because  protection  maintains 
a  market  that  now  they  cannot  have, 

In  the  existing  state  of  things  they  have  to  compete  with  the  low-priced 
labour  of  Russia  and  Poland,  and  are  ruined.  They  desire,  therefore,  that 
their  competition  may  be  with  the  protected  farmers  and  labourers  of  the 
Union. 

Lord  Sydenham,  in  a  letter  to  Lord  John  Russell,  which  accompanied 
his  Report  on  Emigration  to  Upper  Canada,  observed  : 

"Give  me  yeomen,  with  a  few  hundred  pounds  each,  who  will  buy  cleared  farms, 
not  throw  themseives  into  the  bush,  and  I  will  ensure  them  comforts  and  independence 
at  the  end  of  a  couple  of  years — pigs,  pork,  flour,  potatoes,  horses  to  ride,  cows  to  milk — 
but  you  must  eat  all  your  produce,  far  devil  a  purchaser  is  to  be  found:  however,  the  man's 
wants  are  supplied,  and  those  of  his  family ;  he  has  no  rent  or  taxes  to  pay,  and  he 
ought  to  be  satisfied." 

Here  is  the  cause  of  the  desire  for  annexation  that  now  exists  throughout 
Canada.  There  are  no  consumers  at  hand,  and  the  farmer  cannot  exchange 
his  corn  for  cloth  or  iron,  the  consequence  of  which  is,  that  labour  and  land 
are  almost  valueless.  So  is  it  everywhere.  Every  colony  therefore  desires 
to  separate  itself  from  England,  and  all  would  gladly  unite  with  these  United 
States,  and  for  no  other  reason  than  that  they  might  have  protection. 

That  the  colonial  system  is  rapidly  approaching  its  close  must,  I  think, 
be  obvious  to  all  who  take  the  trouble  to  inform  themselves  of  the  condition 
of  the  people  of  her  colonies,  who  have  been  compelled  to  bear  with  it ;  and 
thence  satisfy  themselves  that  the  independent  nations  of  the  world  must 
continue  to  increase  and  to  strengthen  their  measures  of  resistance  until  it 
shall  be  ended,  that  thenceforth  there  may  be  perfect  freedom  of  trade. 

It  is  "  a  war  upon  the  labour  and  capital  of  the  world."  Its  object  is  that 
of  preventing  the  spinner  and  weaver  from  combining  their  efforts  with  those 

•"For  many  years  they  [Messrs.  Arbuthnot  &  Co.,  of  Madras]  have  been  the  most  ex- 
tensive manufacturers  of  sugar  in  Southern  India,  converting  to  the  extent  of  thousands 
of  tons  annually  the  coarse  jaggery  made  by  the  ryots  into  the  fine  product  which  finds 
its  way  into  the  market ;  but  the  attempt  to  raise  the  cane  was  first  tried  about  two  or 
three  years  since,  and  it  is  needless  to  say  that  no  cost  or  skill  was  spared  to  render  it 
successful.  Planters  were  brovght  from  the  West  Indies  at  liberal  salaries  to  direct  the 
cultivation,  and  machinery  of  tne  most  complete  and  extensive  character  was  imported 
from  England  to  irrigate  the  soil  and  manufacture  the  sugar  on  the  spot.  No  project 
could  possibly  be  set  on  foot  under  circumstances  more  favourable,  but  the  upshot  is  that 
the  land  taken  in  Rajahmundry  and  Dawlaishwarum  has  been  relinquished,  and  the 
cattle  turned  into  the  fields  of  standing  cane.  *  *  *  * 

«  The  question  of  competition  to  be  maintained  on  the  existing  system  with  the  West 
Indies  and  the  countries  in  which  slave  labour  prevails  must  rest  for  future  consideration. 
At  present  we  have  arrived  at  the  important  conclusion,  that,  under  the  most  favourabln 
circumstances,  we  cannot  hope  to  alter  the  present  mode  of  cultivating  the  sugar-cane  in 
Southern  India." — Athenaeum. 


THE    HARMONY   OF    INTERESTS.  63 

of  the  farmer  and  planter, — compelling  the  latter  to  work  alone,  and 
therefore  disadvantageously,  and  then  to  give  two-thirds  of  the  crop  for  the 
maintenance  of  horses  and  wagons,  ships  and  men,  brokers  and  merchants, 
whose  services  would  not  be  needed  were  the  system  abolished.  Its  effects 
have  been  everywhere,  to  render  men  depressed  and  poor.  Desiring  to 
liberate  themselves  from  it  our  ancestors  made  the  Revolution,  and  the  Cana- 
dians have  now  formed  a  league,  induced  thereto  by  their  observance  of  the 
wonderful  results  that  have  been  here  obtained. 

Thus  far,  the  system  has  been  maintained  at  home  by  this  power  to  tar 
the  world  for  its  support.  India  contributes  three  millions  sterling  per  annum,* 
but  there  is  a  gradual  diminution  in  the  power  to  pay.  Canada  and  the  West 
Indies  have  paid  their  share,  but  the  connection  with  the  former  is  likely 
soon  to  be  at  ah  end,  and  the  latter  are  ruined.  This  country  is  the  main 
support  of  the  system,  but  that  support  is  gradually  being  withdrawn,  and 
when  it  shall  be  absolutely  so,  the  destructive  effects  of  it  upon  England  her- 
self will  become  fully  obvious.  It  will  then  be  seen  that  the  wealth  of  that 
country  is  really,  to  use  the  words  of  Carlyle,  but  a  magnificent  "sham." 
The  few  are  rich,  but  the  many  are  poor,  and  the  mass  of  wealth  is  by  no 
means  great. 

The  whole  amount  of  capital  invested  in  buildings,  machinery,  &c.  for 
the  cotton  manufacture,  in  1834,  was  estimated  at  twenty  millions  of  pounds 
sterling!  or  less  than  a  hundred  millions  of  dollars,  being  only  double  what 
has  been  expended  in  the  effort  to  bring  into  activity  the  anthracite  coal 
mines  of  Pennsylvania.  She  has  also  machinery  for  the  production  of  a  large 
amount  of  coal  and  iron,  but  the  same  quantity  could  be  produced  in  this 
country  in  a  few  years,  without  an  effort.  She  has  made  a  considerable 
amount  of  rail-roads,  but  she  broke  down  under  the  effort,  and  yet  roads  are 
made  in  that  country  at  far  less  cost  than  here,  and  we  have  now  more 
miles  in  operation. 

The  nominal  cost  of  her  roads  is  great,  because  the  prices  paid  for  land 
are  high,  and  large  sums  are  paid  to  lawyers,  conveyancers,  &c.,  &c., 
but  these  are  merely  transfers  of  property,  not  investments  of  it.  The  real 
investment  is  only  the  labour  employed  in  grading  the  road,  erecting  the 
bridges,  and  getting  out  the  iron,  and  the  cost  of  these  per  mile  is  less  than 
for  any  well-made  road  in  this  country.  The  power  of  England  to  make 
investments  of  labour  is  less  than  half  of  what  it  was  in  this  country  from 
1844  to  1847,  and  less  than  one-third  of  what  it  would  now  be  had  the  pro- 
duction of  coal,  and  iron,  and  cotton  goods  been  allowed  to  increase  at  the 
rate  at  which  it  was  then  increasing.  Her  system  tends  to  the  enrich- 
ment of  the  few,  and  hence  there  results  a  show  of  wealth  far,  very  far,  be- 
yond the  reality. 

The  impoverishing  effects  of  the  system  were  early  obvious,  and  to  the 
endeavour  to  account  for  the  increasing  difficulty  of  obtaining  food  where  the 
whole  action  of  the  laws  tended  to  increase  the  number  of  consumers  of 
food,  and  to  diminish  the  number  of  producers,  was  due  the  invention  of  the 
Malthusian  theory  of  population,  now  half  a  century  old.  That  was  fol- 
lowed by  the  Ricardo  doctrine  of  Rent,  which  accounted  for  the  scarcity  of 
food  by  asserting,  as  a  fact,  that  men  always  commenced  the  work  of  cultiva- 
tion on  rich  soils,  and  that  as  population  increased  they  were  obliged  to 
jesort  to  poorer  ones,  yielding  a  constantly  diminishing  return  to  labour,  and 
producing  a  constant  necessity  for  separating  from  each  other,  if  they  would 

•  "  Altogether  it  has  been  calculated  that  the  tribute  which  India  pours  into  the  lap 
of  England  is  at  least  equal  to  three  millions  sterling." — Porter1 »  Progress  of  tht  Nation, 
Vol.  iii.  p.  354. 

j-  McCulloch's  Statistics,  Vol.  2,  page  75. 


04  THE    HARMONY   OF    INTERESTS. 

obtain  a  sufficiency  of  food.  Upon  this  theory  is  based  the  whole  English 
politico-economical  system.  Population  is  first  supposed  to  be  superabundant, 
when  in  scarcely  any  part  of  the  earth  could  the  labour  of  the  same  num- 
ber of  persons  that  now  constitute  the  population  of  England  obtain  even  one- 
half  the  same  return.  Next,  it  is  supposed  that  men  who  fly  from  England 
go  always  to  the  cultivation  of  rich  soils,  and  therefore  every  thing  is  done 
to  expel  population.  Lastly,  it  is  held  that  their  true  policy  when  abroad  is 
to  devote  all  their  labour  to  the  cultivation  of  those  rich  soils,  sending  the  pro- 
duce to  England  that  it  may  be  converted  into  cloth  and  iron,  and  they  are 
cautioned  against  any  interference  with  perfect  freedom  of  trade  as  "  a  war 
upon  labour  and  capital." 

Colonization  is  urged  on  all  hands,  and  all  unite  in  the  effort  to  force  emi- 
gration in  the  direction  needed  to  raise  up  fl  colonies  of  customers."  It  is 
impossible  to  read  any  work  on  the  subject  without  being  struck  with 
the  prevalence  of  this  "  shopkeeping"  idea.  It  is  seen  everywhere. 
Hungary  was  to  be  supported  in  her  efforts  for  the  establishment  of  her  in- 
dependence, because  she  was  willing  to  have  free  trade,  and  thus  make  a 
market  for  feritish  manufactures.  The  tendency  of  the  Ricardo-Malthusian 
system  to  produce  intensity  of  selfishness  was  never  more  strikingly  mani- 
fested than  on  that  occasion. 

It  happens,  unfortunately,  that  the  system  is  without  a  base,  the  fact  being 
exactly  the  reverse  of  what  it  is  stated  by  Mr.  Ricardo  to  be.  Throughout 
the  world,  and  at  all  periods  of  time,  men  have  commenced  the  work  of  cul- 
tivation upon  the  poorer  soils,  leaving  to  their  successors  the  clearing  of  river 
bottoms  and  the  draining  of  swamps;  and  the  increase  of  population  it 
has  been  that  has  everywhere  enabled  men  to  subject  rich  soils  to  cultivation.* 
Food,  therefore,  tends  to  grow  faster  than  population,  when  no  disturbing 
causes  exist,  and  in  order  that  the  increase  of  population  may  take  place, 
it  is  indispensable  that  the  consumer  take  his  place  by  the  side  of  the  pro- 
ducer. When  that  is  not  the  case,  the  inevitable  consequence  is  that  the 
waste  of  labour  is  great,  and  that  the  perpetual  cropping  of  the  land  return- 
ing to  it  none  of  the  refuse,  exhaustsjjie  land  and  its  owner,  and  compels 
the  latter  to  fly  to  other  poor  soils,  increasing  the  transportation  and  dimin- 
ishing still  further  tke  quantity  of  cloth  and  iron  to  be  obtained  in  return  to 
a  given  amount  of  labour. 

We  thus  have  here,  first,  a  system  that  is  unsound  and  unnatural,  and 
second,  a  theory  invented  for  the  purpose  of  accounting  for  the  poverty  and 
wretchedness  which  are  its  necessary  results.  The  miseries  of  Ireland  are 
charged  to  over-population,  although  millions  of  acres  of  the  richest  soils  of 
the  kingdom  are  waiting  drainage  to  take  their  place  among  the  most  pro- 
ductive in  the  world,  and  although  the  people  of  Ireland  are  compelled  to 
waste  more  labour  than  would  pay,  many  times  over,  for  all  the  cloth 
and  iron  they  consume.!  The  wretchedness  of  Scotland  is  charged  to  over- 

*  For  a  full  examination  of  this  question  I  must  refer  to  my  book,  «  The  Past,  the  Pre- 
sent, and  the  Future." 

•j-  Of  single  counties,  Mayo,  with  a  population  of  389,000,  and  a  rental  of  only  300.000J., 
has  an  area  of  1,364,000  acres,  of  which  800,000  are  waste!  No  less  than  470,000  acres, 
being  very  nearly  equal  to  the  whole  extent  of  surface  now  under  cultivation,  are  declared 
to  be  reclaimable.  Gal  way,  with  a  population  of  423,000,  and  a  valued  rental  of  433,OOOZ., 
has  upwards  of  700,000  acres  of  waste,  410,000  of  which  are  reclaimable!  Kerry,  with 
a  population  of  293,000,  has  an  area  of  1,1 86,000  acres— 727,000  being  waste,  and  400,000 
of  them  reclaimable !  Even  the  union  of  Glenties,  Lord  Monteagle's  ne  plus  ultra  of  re- 
dundant population,  has  an  area  of  245,000  acres,  of  which  200,000  are  waste,  and  for 
the  most  part  reclaimable,  to  its  population  of  43,000.  While  the  barony  of  Ennis,  that 
abomination  of  desolation,  has  230,000  acres  of  land  to  its  5,000  paupers — a  proportion 
which,  as  Mr.  Carter,  one  of  the  principal  proprietors,  remarks  in  his  cirrilar  advertise- 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  65 

population  when  a  large  portion  of  the  land  is  so  tied  up  by  entails  as  to 
forbid  improvement,  and  almost  to  forbid  cultivation.  The  difficulty  of  ob- 
taining food  in  England  is  ascribed  to  over-population,  when  throughout  the 
kingdom  a  large  portion  of  the  land  is  occupied  as  pleasure  grounds,  by 
men  whose  fortunes  are  due  to  the  system  which  has  ruined  Ireland  and 
India.*  Over-population  is  the  ready  excuse  for  all  the  evils  of  a  vicious 
system,  and  so  will  it  continue  to  be  until  that  system  shall  see  its  end,  the 
time  for  which  is  now  rapidly  approaching. 

To  maintain  it,  the  price  of  labour  in  England  must  be  kept  steadjly  at 
a  point  so  low  as  to  enable  her  to  underwork  the  Hindoo,  the  German,  and 
the  American,  with  all  the  disadvantage  of  freight  and  duties.  To  termi- 
nate it,  the  price  of  labour  in  England  must  be  raised  to  such  a  point  as  will 
prevent  that  competition  and  compel  her  to  raise  her  own  food,  leaving  others 
to  consume  their  own,  and  such  must  be  the  result  of  the  thorough  adoption 
of  the  protective  system,  even  by  the  United  States  alone. 

The  cause  of  the  difficulty  in  which  England  now  finds  herself  is  the 
unnatural  disproportion  between  consumers  and  producers.  Men  are  cheap 
and  therefore  undervalued.  Establish  a  market  for  these  men,  and  their 
value  will  rise,  and  such  will  be  the  effect  in  every  part  of  Europe.  We 
have  seen  that  immigration  into  this  country  increased  in  the  period  between 
1830  and  1834,  from  twelve  to  sixty-seven  thousand  ;  that  from  that  period  to 
1843  it  remained  almost  stationary  ;  and  that  in  the  last  four  years  it  has 
more  than  trebled.  Now,  let  us  suppose  that  the  system  of  1828  had  been 
maintained,  and  that  the  mining  of  coal,  the  smelting  and  rolling  of  iron, 
and  the  manufacture  of  cotton  and  woollen  cloths,  &c.  had  gone  on  uninter- 
ruptedly, producing  a  great  demand  for  labour  to  be  employed  in  the  various 
branches  of  manufacture,  in  the  making  of  roads,  the  clearing  of  lands  and 
the  building  of  houses,  and  that  the  inducements  for  emigration  to  this 
country  had  been  constantly  increasing  to  such  an  extent  as  to  cause  the 


ment  for  tenants,  <:is  at  the  rate  of  only  one  family  to  230  acres;  so  that  if  but  one  head 
of  a  family  were  employed  to  every  230  acres,  there  need  not  be  a  single  pauper  in  the 
entire  district;  a  proof,"  he  adds,  "THAT  NOTHING  BUT  EMPLOYMENT  is  WANTING  TO 
SET  THIS  COUNTRY  TO  RIGHTS  !"  In  which  opinion  we  fiilly  coincide. —  Westminster  Re- 
view. 

*  Poulett  Scrope,  a  member  of  the  British  Parliament,  has  inserted  in  the  London 
Morning  Chronicle  seven  letters  of  Notes  of  a  Tour  in  the  United  Kingdom,  with  a  view 
to  ascertain  whether  the  labouring  population  be  really  redundant.  His  general  conclusion 
is  expressed  in  the.se  terms: — "  I  have  selected  striking  illustrations  in  support  of  the  view 
I  have  always  entertained,  and  which  is  at  length  obtaining  verv  general  acquiescence  : 
namely,  that  the  population  of  the  United  Kingdom  is  not  really  in  excess ;  that  the  land 
is  everywhere — even  in  the  most  seemingly  over-peopled  and  pauperized  districts  of 
Ireland — amply  copable  of  repaying  the  employment  of  additional  labour  to  an  indefi- 
nite extent,  if  only  judicious  use  be  made  of  it  by  those  whom  the  law  has  intrusted  with 
its  ownership,  and  that  the  law  itself  be  so  modified  as  to  encourage,  instead  of  discour 
aging,  improvement,  to  secure  to  industry  its  due  reward,  and  to  neglect  and  mismanage- 
ment its  fitting  punishment." 

The  notes  on  Ireland,  afford  a  frightful  picture  of  one  of  the  many  evils  with  which 
that  country  is  afflicted  : 

"  In  Galway  Union,  recent  accounts  declared  the  number  of  poor  evicted,  and  their 
homes  levelled  within  the  last  two  years,  to  equal  the  numbers  in  Kilrush — 4,000  families 
and  20,000  human  beings  are  said  to  have  been  here  also  thrown  upon  the  road,  house- 
lees  and  homeless.  I  can  readily  believe  the  statement,  for  to  me  some  parts  of  the 
country  appeared  like  an  enormous  graveyard — the  numerous  gables  of  the  unroofed 
dwellings  seemed  to  be  gigantic  tombstones.  They  were,  indeed,  records  of  decay  and 
death  far  more  melancholy  than  the  grave  can  show.  Looking  on  them,  the  doubt  rose 
in  my  mind,  am  I  in  a  civilized  country?  Have  we  really  a  free  constitution?  Cai 
such  scenes  be  paralleled  jn  Siberia  or  Caffraria?" 


66  THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 

ratio  of  increase  from  1830  to  1834  to  be  maintained,  and  see  what  would 
have  been  the  result.  By  the  year  1839  it  would  have  reached  300,000, 
and  five  years  after  it  would  have  exceeded  a  million,  and  the  growth  would 
every  year  have  been  more  rapid,  for  the  demand  for  labour  would  have  in- 
creased faster  than  the  supply. 

Before  this  time,  the  flight  from  Great  Britain  and  Ireland  alone  would 
have  far  exceeded  half  a  million  per  annum,  and  what  would  be  the  effect 
of  such  a  state  of  things  may  be  conceived  by  those  who  read  the  following 
article  which  I  take  from  the  London  Times. 

The  flight  of  a  quarter  of  a  million  inhabitants  of  these  islands  to  distant  quarters  of 
the  world  in  1847,  was  one  of  the  most  marvellous  events  in  the  annals  of  human  mi- 
gration. The  miserable  circumstances  under  which  die  majority  left  their  homes,  the 
element  traversed  in  quest  of  a  refuge,  the  thousands  of  miles  over  which  the  dreary  pil- 
grimage was  protracted,  the  fearful  casualties  of  the  voyage  by  shipwreck,  by  famine 
and  by  fever,  constituted  a  fact  which  we  believe  to  be  entirely  without  precedent,  and 
compared  with  which  the  irruption  of  the  northern  races  into  southern  Europe  became 
rrifere  summer's  excursions ;  but,  perhaps  the  marvel  of  the  event  is  surpassed  this  year. 
The  impetus,  or  rather  the  combination  of  impelling  causes,  no  longer  exists.  It  might 
be  supposed  that  so  extensive  a  drain  had  exhausted  the  migratory  elements  of  the 
nation. 

It  might  also  be  expected  that  the  countries  which  last  year  could  not  receive  the  fugi- 
tive masses  without  much  difficulty  and  complaint,  would  have  offered  vehement  protests 
against  an  immediate  renewal  of  the  hungry  invasion.  It  is,  nevertheless,  the  fact  that 
the  migration  of  this  year  is  nearly  equal  to  that  of  the  last.  The  grand  total  from  all  the 
British  ports  for  the  first  eleven  months  of  last  year  was  244,251 ;  for  the  first  eleven 
months  of  this  year,  220,053.  Nor  do  these  figures  represent  the  whole  truth  of  the 
case.  They  are  merely  the  numbers  of  those  who  embarked  at  ports  where  there  are 
government  emigration  officers,  and  who  have  passed  under  official  review.  Some  thou- 
sands of  the  better  class  of  emigrants  are  not  included  in  the  census.  There  can,  there- 
fore, be  no  doubt  that  in  these  two  years  more  than  half  a  million  natives  of  these  islands 
have  fled  to  other  shores. 

The  annual  migration,  it  appears,  is  now  approaching  the  annual  increase  of  our  popu 
lation,  which  is  vulgarly  magnified  into  a  Uiousand  a  day,  but  in  fact  is  not  more  than 
about  290,000  in  the  year.  Now,  it  is  not  to  be  imagined  for  a  moment  that  Great 
Britain,  at  all  events,  has  reached  the  limit  of  its  population.  The  capital,  the  stock  and 
the  "  plant"  of  the  island  are  continually  increasing  and  have  lately  increased  more  ra 
pidly  than  ever.  They  also  demand  more  and  more  hands  for  their  further  develop 
ment.  Under  ordinary  circumstances,  therefore,  we  should  be  justified  in  dreading  a 
migration  which  left  the  population  stationary ;  and  which,  with  a  view  to  the  growing 
trade  and  resources  of  the  country,  was  rather  a  depopulation  than  anything  else.  At  all 
events,  the  fact  suggests  that  a  spontaneous  movement  of  so  gigantic  a  character  may  well 
be  left  to  itself,  and  requires  no  artificial  stimulus.  The  matter  certainly  has  come  tc 
that  pass  which  makes  caution  the  first  duty  of  the  state. 

It  is  from  Ireland  that  we  draw  our  rough  labour.  The  Celt — and  we  are  bound  to 
give  him  credit  for  it — is  the  hewer  of  wood  and  drawer  of  water  to  the  Saxon.  Can 
we  spare  that  growing  mine  of  untaught  but  teachable  toil  1  The  great  works  of  this 
country  depend  on  cheap  labour.  The  movement  now  in  progress  bids  fair  to  affect  that 
condition  of  the  national  prosperity.  The  United  States  gain  what  we  lose. 

Protection  is  a  measure  of  necessary  defence  against  a  system  that  tends 
to  lessen  everywhere  the  value  of  labour,  and  if  applied  effectually,  the  cor- 
rection will  be  speedy,  and  thenceforward  trade  may  everywhere  be  free. 
To  those  who  doubt  this,  I  would  recommend  an  examination  of  the  effects 
that  would  now  result  from  the  abolition  of  the  tariff,  and  the  substitution  of 
free  trade  for  the  present  imperfect  protection.  They  could  not  but  see  that 
it  would  close  every  mill  and  furnace  in-the  Union,  cutting  off  a  demand  for 
600,000  bales  of  cotton,  and  a  supply  of  700,000  tons  of  iron.  Where 
then  should  we  sell  the  one,  or  where  buy  the  other?  The  labourer  in  fac- 
tories and  furnaces  would  then  grow  food,  but  the  market  abroad  for  food  is 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  67 

now  almosi:  closed* — or  cotton,  and  the  market  for  cotton  is  already  ruined 
whenever  the  crop  touches  the  point  of  two  millions  and  a  half  of  bales. 
Protection  is  right  or  wrong.  Free  trade  is  right  or  wrong.  If  protection 
is  right,  it  should  be  complete  and  fixed,  until  no  longer  needed.  If  free 
trade  is  right,  custom-houses  should  be  abolished.  Halfway  measures  are 
always  wrong. 

The  direct  effect  of  the  maintenance  of  the  present  system,  that  of  1846, 
is  to  cause  renewed  efforts  on  the  part  of  England  for  engrossing  the  market 
of  this  country,  whereas  a  return  to  that  of  1842,  were  it  made  with  the  ap- 
probation and  consent  of  all  parts  of  the  Union,  would  be  followed  by  results 
that  would  compel  a  change  of  policy.  The  direct  effect  of  a  thorough  and 
complete  change  insour  system  would  be,  that  of  teaching  the  whole  people 
of  England  that  if  they  "  expect  to  be  prosperous  and  happy,  they  must 
seek  those  blessings  in  the  steady  pursuit  of  a  British  policy — in  cultivating 
domestic  resources — in  protecting  domestic  interests — in  drawing  closely 
the  bonds  of  concord,  strengthened  by  the  ties  of  mutual  dependence  among 
themselves,  and  abandoning  the  shadowy  and  delusive  expectation  of  find- 
ing compensation  in  foreign  commerce  for  the  destruction  of  the  springs  of 
domestic  consumption." 

The  harmony  of  all  real  interests  among  nations  is  perfect.  The  system 
of  England  is  rotten  and  unsound — injurious  to  herself  and  to  the  world. 
It  is  the  cause  of  pauperism  and  wretchedness  at  home  and  abroad,  and  the 
more  effective  the  measures  that  may  be  adopted  for  the  purpose  of  com- 
pelling its  abandonment,  the  better  will  it  be  for  her  and  for  ourselves.  The 
road  to  absolute  freedom  of  trade  lies  through  perfect  protection. 

CHAPTER  SIXTH. 

HOW   PROTECTION    AFFECTS    COMMERCE. 

COMMERCE  is  an  exchange  of  equivalents.  The  greater  the  number  of 
commodities  produced,  the  greater,  other  things  being  equal,  will  be  the 
number  of  exchanges.  Commerce  tends,  therefore,  to  grow  with  the  in- 
crease of  production. 

The  machine  of  production  is  the  earth.  The  instrument  by  aid  of 
which  it  is  made  to  produce  is  man.  To  induce  man  to  labour,  he  must  feel 
confident  of  obtaining  an  equivalent;  and  the  larger  that  equivalent,  the  stronger 
will  be  the  inducement  to  exertion.  The  more  advantageously  his  powers  are 
applied,  the  larger  will  be  the  production,  and  the  larger  the  equivalent  of  a 
given  quantity  of  labour. 

One  man  raises  grain  and  another  sugar.  Each  desires  to  exchange  with 
the  other,  giving  labour  for  labour. 

*  The  present  price  of  flour  in  England  varies  little  from  $5.  What  is  likely  soon  to  b« 
the  price  of  pork,  may  be  judged  of  from  the  following,  which  I  take  from  the  papers  of 
the  day. 

A  London  letter,  under  date  of  Oct.  12,  from  a  mercantile  house  extensively  engaged  in 
the  trade,  says:  "We  have  the  pleasure  to  hand  you  annexed  our  price  current,  in  which 
you  will  see  the  comparative  imports  for  the  last  three  years;  the  present  year  showing 
an  excess  of  25,000  packages  of  American  bacon  more  than  the  last.  The  general  ex- 
pectation with  us  is  that  prices  must  be  very  low  the  approaching  season,  from  the  in- 
crease of  hogs  in  Ireland  and  Germany,  and  the  very  great  production  of  hogs  and  all 
kinds  of  meat  in  this  country  more  than  usual.  We  incline  to  the  opinion  that  should 
.ne  same  quantity  and  quality  of  American  come  to  this  market  the  next,  as  during  the 
cast  season,  one-half  of  it  will  have  to  be  sold  for  soap  purposes.  You  will  have  heard 
that  our  government  contract  for  pork  was  taken  at  10/  per  cwt.  less  than  last  year,  which 
we  think  is  a  pretty  fair  criterion  of  the  market." 


68  THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 

The  quantity  of  grain  that  must  be  given  for  sugar  is  dependent  upon  the 
quantity  of  both  produced.  If  the  season  be  favourable  for  the  first,  the 
crop  will  be  large.  If  unfavourable  for  the  second,  the  crop  will  be  small. 
Much  grain  will  then  be  given  for  little  sugar,  and  vice  versa,  if  the  season 
be  favourable  for  sugar  and  unfavourable  for  grain,  much  sugar  will  be 
given  for  little  grain.  In  either  case  both  parties  suffer,  and  commence  is 
diminished.  Each  is  therefore  directly  interested  in  doing  whatever  may 
be  in  his  power  to  increase  the  returns  to  the  labour  of  his  neighbour,  and 
thus  increase  the  extent  of  commerce. 

To  increase  production  is,  then,  to  increase  commerce.  By  ascertaining 
the  circumstances  which  tend  to  limit  the  one,  we  shall  ascertain  those  which 
tend  to  limit  the  other.  To  do  so,  it  is  needed  only  to  call  to  our  aid  a  few 
simple  laws  that  may  be  found  in  any  treatise  of  natural  philosophy. 
They  are  these : — 

First.  The  greater  the  power,  other  circumstances  being  equal,  the  greater 
will  be  tho  effect. 

The  producer  of  food  labours  every  day  and  all  day.  The  producer  of 
sugar  labours  but  three  days  in  the  week.  The  quantity  of  food  produced 
is  large  and  that  of  sugar  small.  The  food-producer  gives  much  food  for 
little  sugar — much  labour  for  little  labour. 

What  is  true  of  individuals  is  equally  true  of  communities.  If  the  com- 
munity of  food-producers  work  every  day,  and  that  of  sugar-producers  but 
three  days  in  the  week,  the  whole  of  the  first  will  be  taxed  because  of  the  in- 
dolence of  the  last,  and  commerce  will  be  diminished.  If  the  whole  community 
of  food-producers  work  every  day,  and  one  half  of  that  of  iron-producers  do 
not  work — or  if  they  apply  their  labour  to  other  works  than  those  of  produc- 
tion— the  quantity  of  iron  produced  will  be  small,  and  much  food  will  be 
given  for  little  iron.  If  the  food-producing  community  could  induce  the 
workers  in  iron  to  labour  every  day  and  all  day,  there  would  be  more  iron  to 
be  given  for  food,  commerce  would  be  increased,  and  all  would  profit  thereby. 
By  what  means  could  this  be  accomplished?  To  ascertain  this,  we  must 
inquire  the  causes  of  their  working  so  little.  Doing  so,  we  might  find  that 
among  them  there  was  a  large  proportion  perfectly  able  to  labour  produc- 
tively, but  unwilling  so  to  do ;  that  some  of  them  employed  themselves  in 
carrying  muskets,  casting  cannon,  building  forts  and  palaces,  constructing 
ships  of  war  and  sailing  in  them  ;  and  that  others  did  nothing  except  so  far 
as  they  were  employed  in  devising  modes  of  enabling  them,  out  of  the  labour  of 
others,  to  support  themselves  and  those  employed  in  the  various  operations  to 
which  I  nave  referred;  and  that  hosts  of  others  were  employed  in  carrying 
back  and  forth  the  products  of  the  lands  of  others,  and  keeping  accounts  of 
what  they  did,  and  that  thus  one  half  of  the  community  produced  nothing, 
while  consuming  much.  The  other  half  we  might  find  to  consist  of  men  who 
were  sometimes  willing  to  work  but  not  able,  having  no  work  to  do,  and  at  others 
able  but  not  willing,  because  of  the  small  equivalent  obtained,  by  reason  of  the 
necessity  for  contributing  so  large  a  portion  of  their  earnings  to  the  support  of 
those  who  carried  the  muskets,  built  the  ships  and  kept  the  accounts ;  and  the 
result  might  be,  that  we  should  find  that,  although  the  food-producers  gave 
much, the  iron-producers  received  little,  the  principal  part  being  swallowed  up 
by  the  intermediate  men,  who  consumed  much  while  producing  nothing.  It  is 
obvious  that  if  all  worked,  there  would  be  three  times  as  much  iron  produced, 
that  commerce  would  be  increased,  and  that  the  producer  of  food  would  ob- 
tain far  more  iron  as  the  equivalent  of  far  less  food.  The  food-producing 
community  is  therefore  contributing  largely  towards  the  support  of  those  of 
the  iron-producing  one  who  are  able  to  work  and  not  willing  to  do  so; 
and  their  condition  will  be  improved  if  they  can  induce  those  who  are  able 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  69 

and  willing  to  work  to  come  forth  from  among  those  who  are  neither  able  nor 
willing,  leaving  the  latter  class  to  produce  food  and  iron  for  themselves.  The 
amount  of  power  to  be  applied  will  be  increased,  and  the  product  will  be 
greater,  while  there  will  be  fewer  among  whom  to  divide  it.  The  return  to 
labour  will  be  larger,  and  the  power  of  accumulation  will  be  increased. 

Second.  The  more  directly  power -is  applied,  the  greater  is  its  effect. 

The  producers  of  food  and  iron  are  distant  from  each  other,  and  the  labour 
required  for  effecting  their  exchanges  is  great.  The  one  obtains  his  iron  by 
the  indirect  process  of  raising  food  for  distant  men.  The  other  obtains  his 
food  by  that  of  making  iron  for  distant  men,  and  many  horses  and  wagon?, 
ships  and  men,  stand  between  them.  The  friction  is  great  and  production 
is  small.  The  equivalents  to  be  exchanged  are  few  in  number,  and  com- 
merce is  limited.  The  equivalent  of  a  day's  labour  in  either  food  or  iron  is 
small.  If  the  producer  of  iron  could  draw  near  to  the  producer  of  food,  the 
number  of  horses  and  wagons,  ships  and  men,  standing  between  them,  would 
be  diminished,  and  the  number  of  producers  would  be  increased.  The 
equivalents  to  be  exchanged  would  increase  in  number,  commerce  would 
grow,  and  the  equivalent  of  a  day's  labour  would  be  greater. 

Third.  The  more  steadily  power  is  applied,  the  greater  is  its  effect.  At 
one  moment  the  wind  blows  a  gale,  while  at  another  there  is  a  calm.  The 
steam-engine  works  every  day  and  all  day,  and  although  the  amount  of  power 
applied  is  less,  the  voyage  is  made  in  shorter  time.  To  secure  the  steady 
application  of  power,  the  air-chamber  is  provided,  and  the  force  produced  by 
the  action  of  the  piston-rod  is  by  its  aid  distributed  over  the  whole  period 
intervening  between  the  strokes. 

The  producer  of  food  is  often  idle.  At  other  times  he  is  moderately  em- 
ployed. In  harvest  times  he  is  hurried,  and  he  loses  part  of  his  crop  for 
want  of  aid.  If  he  could  have  the  equivalent  of  an  air-chamber,  by  aid  of 
which  his  efforts  could  be  divided  over  the  year,  the  return  obtained  for  his 
labours  would  be  largely  increased. 

The  producer  of  iron  may  labour  at  all  seasons,  but  a  large  portion  of  his 
work — the  mining  of  coal  and  ore — may  be  done  in  advance,  and  when  he 
has  a  stock  on  hand  he  can  suspend  his  operations  for  a  season.  If  the 
producer  of  food  could  induce  him  to  come  and  labour  in  his  vicinity,  he 
could  at  one  period  of  the  year  help  him  to  mine  or  transport  ore  and  fuel, 
and  the  other  could,  at  another  period,  aid  him  in  gathering  his  croj-.  The 
first  could  then  cultivate  more  land,  and  the  equivalent  of  labour,  in  both 
food  and  iron,  would  be  increased,  and  commerce  would  grow  in  exti.nt  with 
the  increase  of  equivalents  to  be  exchanged. 

Fourth.  The  more  perfect  the  machinery  the  smaller  will  be  the  quantity 
required,  the  less  will  be  the  friction,  and  the  greater  will  be  the  effect.  The 
iron  wheels  of  the  engine  encounter  little  friction  in  passing  on  the  irou 
rail,  and  the  force  of  a  man's  hand  moves  tons,  where,  if  applied  to  a  cart- 
wheel, it  could  not  move  a  hundred. 

The  producer  of  food  obtains  from  the  distant  iron  man  s'/iall  supplies 
of  iron  as  the  equivalent  of  large  quantities  of  food.  He  is  therefore  obliged 
to  use  wood  where  he  would  desire  to  use  iron.  The  friction  is  great,  and 
labour  is  unproductive.  The  equivalent  of  a  day's  labour  is  small.  If  he 
could  induce  the  iron  man  to  come  near  him,  the  equivalent  of  labour  would 
be  largely  increased,  and  he  could  use  iron  in  place  of  wood. 

Fifth.  The  more  enduring  the  machinery,  the  smaller  will  be  the  quantity 
of  labour  required  for  its  reproduction,  and  the  greater  will  be  the  quantity 
that  may  be  given  to  the  production  of  further  machinery.  The  wooden  post 
rots,  and  must  be  replaced.  The  iron  one  endures  almost  for  ever. 

The  producer  of  food,  distant  from  the  producer  of  iron,  builds  ships,  and 


70  THE    HARMONY    OF   INTERESTS. 

fences  his  land  with  wooden  posts.  Much  of  his  time  is  occupied  in  repairing 
and  renewing  them.  If  he  could  induce  the  producer  of  iron  to  live  near 
him,  he  would  assist  in  building  furnaces,  and  might  then  use  iron  posts ; 
and  then  labour  that  would  otherwise  be  employed  in  renewing  old,  might 
be  given  to  creating  new  machinery  of  ether  kinds,  to  aid  in  the  work  of 
production,  and  the  equivalent  of  a  day's  labour  would  be  increased. 

We  see,  thus,  that  the  larger  the  quantity  of  labour,  and  the  more  directly 
and  steadily  it  is  applied,  and  the  more  perfect  and  enduring  the  machinery 
by  which  it  is  aided,  the  larger  is  the  return  to  labour,  and  the  greater  the 
number  of  equivalents  to  be  exchanged. 

Let  us  now  suppose,  first,  that  one  community  has  it  in  its  power  to  mo- 
nopolize the  production  of  iron,  and  that  of  its  members  many  spend  all 
their  time  in  idleness,  while  others  are  but  occasionally  employed — that  many 
spend  their  time  in  carrying  muskets  on  their  shoulders,  while  very  many 
are  dissolute  and  drunken — and  that  the  result  is,  that  the  quantity  of  iron 
produced  is  but  one  half  or  one-third  of  what  it  would  otherwise  be.  Com- 
merce is  but  an  exchange  of  equivalents,  and  the  quantity  of  food  that  must 
be  given  for  a  ton  of  iron  is  double  what  it  would  otherwise  be.  It  is  obvious 
that  the  food-producing  community  is  taxed  for  the  support  of  the  idle  and 
worthless  members  of  the  iron-producing  community. 

Second.  That,  in  addition  to  all  this,  the  iron-producing  community  is 
thus  enabled  to  compel  the  food-producing  community  to  be  idle,  when  their 
labours  are  not  needed  on  the  farm,  and  to  lose  their  crops  for  want  of  aid  in 
harvest.  It  is  obvious  that  here  is  a  second  tax  imposed  for  the  support  of 
the  non-workers  among  the  producers  of  iron. 

Third.  That  the  scarcity  of  iron  compels  the  food- producing  community 
to  use  wagons  and  common  roads  when  they  might  have  railroads,  and  to 
give  to  the  work  of  transportation  ten  days'  labour  instead  of  one.  Here, 
again,  we  have  a  tax  imposed  for  the  support  of  the  non-workers  among  the 
producers  of  iron.  The  food-producers  are  compelled  to  transport  their 
products  to  a  distance,  and  deprived  of  the  power  to  make  roads  by  which 
to  do  it. 

Fourth.  That  the  producers  of  food  are  compelled  to  employ  more  labour 
in  building  ships  and  wagons,  and  other  perishable  machinery,  than  would 
have  been  sufficient  to  build  the  furnaces  and  rolling  mills,  enduring  ma- 
chinery, required  to  give  them  all  the  iron  they  consumed.  Here  we  have  a 
fourth  tax  imposed  for  the  support  of  the  non-workers  among  the  producers 
of  iron. 

Each  one  of  these  operations  tends  to  diminish  the  number  of  equivalents 
that  may  be  exchanged,  the  number  of  exchanges  made,  and  the  equivalent 
of  a  day's  labour,  in  food,  iron,  or  other  of  the  comforts  or  conveniences  of 
life,  and  the  result  is,  that  the  product  of  labour  is  scarcely  one-fifth  of  what 
it  would  be,  were  all  productively  employed. 

These  things  premised,  we  may  now  examine  the  working  of  the  colonial 
system. 

Colonists  are  men  who  work.  Of  those  who  remain  behind,  a  large  por- 
tion do  not  work.  Some  live  in  poor-houses,  and  others  in  palaces.  Some 
dance  and  sing,  and  others  carry  muskets.  Some  build  ships  of  war,  and 
others  sail  in  them.  The  producers  are  few.  The  non-producers  are  many ; 
yet  they  must  eat,  drink,  wear  clothing,and  have  houses,  and  these  thingsmust 
be  provided  for  them  by  those  who  work.  If  all  worked,  the  quantity  of  iron 
produced  would  be  large,  and  those  who  produced  food  would  get  much 
iron  in  exchange.  As  few  desire  to  work,  and  all  must  eat,  the  colonial 
system  was  invented  forthe  purpose  of  compelling  colonists  to  give  much  food 
and  wool  for  little  iron.  The  consequence  has  been  everywhere  the  same. 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  71 

While  thus  taxed  for  the  maintenance  of  the  money-spending  classes,  the 
colonists  everywhere  have  been  compelled  to  waste  much  labour,  to  work 
with  poor  machinery,  and  to  give  more  of  the  products  of  labour  for  the  use 
of  that  which  is  perishable  than  would  have  produced  that  which  would 
endure  almost  for  ever.  Production  is  small.  The  equivalents  to  be  ex- 
changed are  diminishing  in  number.  Commerce  is  perishing. 

The  Irishman  is  compelled  to  waste  much  labour.*  He  works  with  poor 
machinery.  He  gives  half  the  product  of  his  labour  for  the  use  of  wagons 
and  ships.  He  eats  his  crop  of  potatoes,  and  goes  in  rags.  He  has  nothing 
to  exchange.!  He  flies  to  America,  and  the  number  of  exchanges  to  be  made 
in  Ireland,  and  from  Ireland,  is  thus  diminished. 

The  Hindoo  flies  from  the  valleys  and  plains  to  the  hills,  that  he  may  escape 
from  the  system.  Arrived  at  the  hills,  he  finds  no  demand  for  his  labour  but  in 
the  cultivation  of  his  little  piece  of  land.  He  works  with  poor  machinery, 
and  his  miserable  product  of  fifty  pounds  of  cotton  to  the  acre  is  transported 
to  Manchester,  thence  to  be  returned  to  him  in  the  form  of  cloth,  getting  one 
pound  for  ten  ;  and  thus  giving  nine-tenths  of  his  labour  for  the  use  of  ships 
and  wagons,  perishable  machinery,  when  one-fifth  would  have  done  the 
work  at  home,  could  he  have  had  permanent  machinery.  He  flies  again, 
or  he  dies  of  famine  and  pestilence,  or  he  sells  himself  as  a  slave,  to  go  to 
Demerara ;  and  thus  is  the  number  of  the  exchanges  of  India,  and  from 
India,  diminished. 

Men  are  everywhere  flying  from  British  commerce,  which  everywhere  pur- 
sues them.  Having  exhausted  the  people  of  the  lower  lands  of  India,  it  follows 
them  as  they  retreat  towards  the  fastnesses  of  the  Himalaya.  AfFghanistan 
is  attempted,  while  Scinde  and  the  Punjaub  are  subjugated.  Siamese 
provinces  are  added  to  the  empire  of  free  trade,  and  war  and  desolation 
are  carried  into  China,  in  order  that  the  Chinese  maybe  compelled  to  pay 
for  the  use  of  ships,  instead  of  making  looms.  The  Irishman  flies  to  Canada ; 
but  there  the  system  follows  him,  and  he  feels  himself  insecure  until  within 
this  Union.  The  Englishman  and  the  Scotchman  try  Southern  Africa,  and 
thence  they  fly  to  the  more  distant  New  Holland,  Van  Diemen's  Land,  or 
New  Zealand.  The  farther  they  fly,  the  more  they  must  use  ships  and 
other  perishable  machinery,  the  less  steadily  can  their  efforts  be  applied,  the 
less  must  be  the  power  of  production,  and  the  fewer  must  be  the  equivalents 
to  be  exchanged,  and  yet  in  the  growth  of  ships,  caused  by  such  circum- 
stances, we  are  told  to  look  for  evidence  of  prosperous  commerce! 

The  British  system  is  built  upon  cheap  labour,  by  which  is  meant  low 


*  In  1842,  three  years  before  the  potato  rot,  Ireland  was  thus  described  by  an  English 
traveller :  "  Throughout  the  south  and  west  of  Ireland,  the  traveller  is  haunted  by  the  face 
of  the  popular  starvation.  It  is  not  the  exception — it  is  the  condition  of  the  people.  In  this 
fairest  and  richest  of  countries,  men  are  suffering  and  starving  by  millions.  There  are 
thousands  of  them,  at  this  minute,  stretched  in  the  sunshine  at  their  cabin  doors  with  no 
ioork,  scarcely  any  food,  no  hope  seemingly.  Strong  countrymen  are  lying  in  bed,  «/or  the 
hunger' — because  a  man  lying  on  his  back  does  not  need  so  much  food  as  a  person  a-foot. 
Many  of  them  have  torn  up  the  unripe  potatoes  from  their  little  gardens,  and  to  exist  now 
must  look  to  winter,  when  they  shall  have  to  suffer  starvation  and  cold  too.1'— T/iacAaray. 
Irish  Sketch  Book. 

•(•People  with  whom  starvation  is  «  the  condition"  of  life,  consume  little  of  that  clothing 
which  England  furnishes  in  exchange  for  so  much  labour. 

"  Everywhere,  throughout  all  parts,  even  in  the  best  towns,  and  in  Dublin  itself,  you  will 
meet  men  and  boys — not  dressed,  not  covered — but  hung  round  with  a  collection  of  rags  of 
unrivalled  variety,  squalidity,  and  filth — walking  dunghills.  •  •  *  No  one  ever  saw 
an  English  scarecrow  with  such  rags." — Quarterly  Review. 

Transferred  to  this  country,  every  one  of  these  men  would  become  a  large  o'  nsumer  oi 
food  and  cotton,  and  thus  commerce  would  be  increased. 


72  THE    HARMONY    OF   INTERESTS. 

priced  and  worthless  labour.*  Its  effect  is  to  cause  it  to  become  from  day 
to  day  more  low  priced  and  worthless,  and  thus  to  destroy  production  upon 
which  commerce  must  be  based.  The  object  of  protection  is  to  produce 
dear  labour,  that  is,  high-priced  and  valuable  labour,  and  its  effect  is  to  cause 
it  to  increase  in  value  from  day  to  day,  and  to  increase  the  equivalents  to  be 
exchanged,  to  the  great  increase  of  commerce. 

The  object  of  what  is  now  called  free-trade  is  that  of  securing  to  the 
people  of  England  the  further  existence  of  the  monopoly  of  machinery,  by 
aid  of  which  Ireland  and  India  have  been  ruined,  and  commerce  prostrated. 
Protection  seeks  to  break  down  this  monopoly,  and  to  cause  the  loom  and 
the  anvil  to  take  their  natural  places  by  the  side  of  the  food  and  the  cotton, 
that  production  may  be  increased,  and  that  commerce  may  revive.  How 
far  it  has  tended  here  to  produce  that  effect  we  may  now  examine. 

Prior  to  the  passage  of  the  tariff  of  1828,  our  exchanges  of  iron  amounted 
to  only  25  pounds  per  head.  By  1832  they  had  increased  to  46  pounds 
per  head.  Commerce  thus  had  grown.  From  1834  to  1841,  they  averaged 
45  pounds  per  head.  Commerce  was  stationary.  In  1841  and  '42,  it  fell  to 
38  pounds.  Commerce  had  fallen  with  what  was  called  free-trade.  From 
1844  to  1847,  the  equivalents  of  iron  to  be  exchanged  had  increased  to  97 
pounds  per  head.  Commerce  had  grown  with  protection.  They  are  now  73 
pounds  per  head.  Commerce  has  fallen  with  the  diminution  of  protection. 
If  we  turn  now  to  coal,  cotton,  woollens,  ships,  or  railroads,  similar  facts 
meet  us  everywhere.  The  number  of  exchanges  grows  with  the  system 
that  looks  to  the  elevation  of  the  labourer.  It  diminishes  with  that  which 
looks  for  its  growth  to  the  depression  of  the  labourer.  The  interests  of 
commerce  are  therefore  in  perfect  harmony  with  those  of  manufactures  and 
agriculture. 

The  one  system  repels  population.     The  other  attracts  it,  and  hence  it 

*  The  poor  silk  weaver  described  in  the  following  paragraph,  which  I  take  from  the 
London  Spectator,  is  the  type  of  the  system.  He  works  so  'cheap'  that  he  starves  the  poor 
Hindoo,  and  then  starves  himself.  "  His  case  would  not  be  cured  by  protection."  What  he 
needs  is  the  transfer  of  his  labour  from  what  is  here  called  "production,"  but  what  is. 
really  only  the  conversion  of  the  products  of  others,  to  that  only  thing  which  can  be  called 
production,  and  which  consists  in  an  increase  of  the  quantity  of  commodities  to  be  con 
sumed.  He  merely  changes  their  form  from  silk  to  silken  cloth.  Were  his  labours 
employed  on  any  of  the  many  millions  of  rich  yet  waste  land  within  the  kingdom,  he 
would  obtain  more  and  better  food,  at  less  cost  of  labour.  He  could  then  feed  better,  and 
have  more  to  offer  in  exchange.  Commerce  would  then  grow. 

"  Nearer  to  us,  in  the  outlying  parts  of  the  metropolis,  the  traveller  of  '  The  Morning 
Chronicle' describes  regions  where  the  people  are  hopelessly  contending  with  a  system  of 
industry  that  is  fostered  by  commerce,  because  it  yields  <  profit,' and  is  peopled,  because  it 
sometimes  yields  subsistence— the  means  of  keeping  body  and  soul  together,  though  not 
always  that.  We  know  that  the  describer  does  not  exaggerate.  Many  and  many  a  man 
toils,  with  others  of  his  family,  from  dark  before  the  dawn  until  far  into  the  next  night,  as 
long  as  human  endurance  will  last,  and  then  the  produce  of  their  industry  falls  short  of 
subsistence.  You  say, 'it  is  a  decaying  trade.'  It  is  not  a  decaying  trade :  read 'The 
Morning  Chronicle,' and  see  how  the  workman  makes  silk  which,  in  spite  of  free  trade, 
not  only  beats  the  Frenchman  out  of  the  market,  it  is  so  good  and  so  '  cheap,'  but  is  fur- 
ther  cheapened  to  bribe  customers  with  reductions  of  prices  filched  from  the  wages  of  the 
miserable  workman.  Protection  would  not  cure  that  man's  case.  Go  round  the  district, 
stranger  to  you  than  Brussels,  Lyons,  or  Genoa,  and  survey  the  dull,  level  aspect  of  poverty 
over  all — poor  workpeople,  poor  small  tradesmen — a  town  of  back  streets.  See  the  number 
of  shops  dealing  in  articles  at  second  hand — not  merely  pawn-shops,  but  small  clothes- 
dealers,  traders  in  shop-marked  stationery,  dealers  in  apples  that  have  seen  better  years 
in  happier  regions;  the  very  grocery  looks  window-stained.  Production,  production,  in 
R  ceaseless  round,  hot  not  enough  subsistence  for  that  sad  nation;  many  things  made  and 
sold,  and  resold,  but  too  few  of  them  things  to  eat." 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  73 

is  that  we  see  the  whole  people  of  Europe  anxious  to  reach  our  shores. 
Abolish  protection  and  immigration  will  cease,  and  commerce  will  diminish, 
for  there  will  be  less  cloth  and  iron  to  be  exchanged  against  labour.  Make 
protection  perfect  and  permanent,  and  immigration  will  increase  rapidly, 
for  there  will  be  more  cloth  and  iron  to  be  exchanged  against  labour. 

Were  Ireland  this  day  free,  she  would  establish  protection  and  thus  arrest 
emigration.  Food,  and  cloth,  and  iron,  would  become  more  abundant,  and 
commerce  would  grow.  Were  Canada  independent,  she  would  establish  pro- 
tection, and  then  she  would  retain  the  immigrant  coming  from  Ireland  or  Eng- 
land. Were  India  independent,  she  too  would  establish  protection,  and  then 
the  culture  of  cotton  would  be  resumed  on  the  rich  lands  of  Bengal.  In  all 
these  cases  production  would  be  increased,  and  the  power  to  maintain 
commerce  would  grow.  The  people  of  the  United  States  are  the  best  cus- 
tomers to  the  people  of  England,  because  they  are  in  some  degree  pro- 
tected against  the  exhaustion  consequent  upon  the  existence  of  their  sys- 
tem. Ireland  cannot  buy,  and  she  is  reduced  to  beg.  Were  she  independent 
she  would  make  iron,  and  then  -she  could  buy  fine  cloths,  silks,  books  and 
pictures.  The  well-understood  interests  of  all  nations  are  in  perfect  har- 
mony with  each  other. 

The  object  of  free  trade  is  proclaimed  to  be  the  increase  of  commerce, 
but  commerce  withers  under  it.  Ireland  now  consumes  a  pound  of  cotton 
per  head.  Transfer  an  Irishman  here,  and  he  will  consume  a  dozen  pounds, 
and  700,000  of  her  people  would  make  more  trade  between  the  producers  and 
consumers  of  cotton  than  is  now  maintained  with  the  whole  eight  millions 
of  Ireland.  Were  she  free,  she  would  adopt  protection,  and  trade  would 
grow,  for  she  would  then  need  six  pounds  per  head.  The  commerce  of  the 
Zollverein  has  grown  with  protection.  The  people  of  Germany  now  con- 
sume two  pounds  of  cotton  where  before  they  consumed  but  one.  The  com- 
merce of  India  diminishes  with  every  approach  to  what  is  called  free  trade. 
The  producers  of  cotton  on  the  lower  lands  of  Bengal  could  have,  as  the 
equivalent  of  a  day's  labour,  quadruple  the  iron  that  can  be  obtained  now 
that  the  cultivator  of  that  commodity  has  been  driven  to  seek  the  high  and 
poor  lands.  

The  free  trader,  so  called,  says  to  the  farmer,  "You  can  have  English  iron 
in  New  York  for  thirty  bushels  of  wheat,  but  you  must  hand  over  to  the 
Treasury  ten  bushels  for  permission  to  make  the  exchange.  If  you  take  a 
ton  of  American  iron,  you  must  give  to  the  producer  of  it  forty  bushels, 
and  thus  are  you  taxed  ten  bushels  for  the  support  of  the  iron  man." 
Abolish  protection  and  we  shall  have  more  food  to  sell  abroad  and  more  iron 
to  buy  abroad,  and  will  need  more  wagons  and  ships,  and  it  will  then  take 
sixty  bushels  of  wheat — perhaps  even  one  hundred — to  pay  for  a  ton  of  iron. 
The  quantity  to  be  exchanged  will  then  fall  to  20  pounds  per  head,  and 
commerce  will  be  diminished. 

The  farmer  has  his  choice  between  giving  thirty  bushels  for  the  support  of 
the  people  who  dance  and  sing  and  live  in  palaces,  and  that  of  those  who 
carry  muskets,  or  ten  for  the  maintenance  of  the  government  under  which 
he  lives.  The  more  he  gives  to  the  first,  the  more  and  the  longer  he  must 
continue  to  give,  the  poorer  he  must  grow,  and  the  less  will  be  the 
power  to  maintain  commerce.  That  such  is  the  case  will  be  obvious 
from  an  examination  of  facts  given  in  the  last  chapter.  In  the  years 
from  1827to'1834,  275,000,000  pounds  of  cotton  would  have  purchased 
1,250,000  tons  of  iron.  In  1845-6,  600,000,000  were  required  to  pay  for 
1,200,000  tons.  What  became  of  the  difference  ?  Were  the  English  miners 
better  clothed  ?  On  the  contrary,  it  was  but  little  before  that  time  that  it 


74  THE    HARMONY   OF    INTERESTe. 

was  made  known  to  the  world  that  males  and  females  worked  together  in 
the  mines,  absolutely  naked.  Was  the  condition  of  the  people  better  ?  On 
the  contrary,  Ireland  was  fast  becoming  a  great  poor-house,  and  the  poor- 
rates  of  England  were  fast  advancing  to  the  point  they  have  now  attained, 
that  of  £8,000,000  per  annum.  What  then  went  with  the  difference  ?  The 
question  may  be  answered  by  pointing  to  the  vast  increase  of  public  expen- 
diture in  the  last  fifteen  years,  during  which  the  number  of  men  who  carry 
muskets  and  build  ships  of  war  has  been  so  largely  increased  ;  to  the  innum- 
erable and  expensive  commissions  for  ascertaining  the  causes  of  distress  and 
pauperism  ;  to  the  great  fortunes  of  bankers  and  successful  speculators ; 
to  men  like  Hudson,  the  rail-road  king;  to  the  large  number  who  have 
in  the  late  railroad  speculation  realized  immense  fortunes,  as  engineers, 
solicitors,  counsellors  and  parliamentary  agents,  and  to  the  host  of  others 
who  fatten  on  the  people.  The  productive  power  is  diminishing,  and  the 
few  become  greater  as  the  many  become  less.  With  every  step  in  the 
progress  of  the  latter,  the  power  to  maintain  commerce  diminishes,  for  the 
people  become  poorer,  and  the  power  to  produce  commodities  to  be  given  in 
exchange  becomes  more  and  more  limited. 

Whatever  the  occurrence  that  tends  to  diminish  production,  whether  wars 
or  revolutions,  the  increase  of  armies  and  fleets  without  the  actual  occurrence 
of  war,  or  the  increase  of  inequality,  the  few  becoming  richer  and  the  many 
poorer,  the  effect  is  to  impose  a  tax  upon  the  consumers  of  the  commodity 
the  production  of  which  is  thus  restrained.  Under  a  system  of  real  freedom 
of  trade  the  chief  portion  of  this  tax  would  be  paid  by  the  actors  themselves, 
for  the  immediate  effect  of  such  occurrences  would  be  that  of  stimulating 
other  nations  to  increased  exertions  to  fill  the  vacuum  that  had  been  created. 
Under  the  system  which  gives  to  one  nation  a  monopoly  of  the  machinery 
for  converting  the  products  of  other  nations,  a  large  portion  of  the  tax  may 
be,  and  is  thrown  upon  them,  and  thus  are  they  made  to  contribute  largely 
towards  the  maintenance  of  all  that  class,  poor  and  rich,  who  prefer  to  live 
by  the  labour  of  others. 

We  have  seen  that  the  quantity  of  cotton  consumed  in  1845  and  '46 
averaged  596,000,000  pounds,  that  the  price  of  gray  cloth  was  6s.  7(L,  and 
that  34,700,000  pieces  delivered  in  Liverpool  would  have  been  required  to 
pay  for  the  cotton  also  delivered  in  Liverpool — all  freights,  charges,  &c., 
being  thus  left  for  the  planter  to  pay. 

The  average  work  of  operatives  in  this  country  would  be  the  conversion  of 
4000  pounds  of  cotton  into  cloth  of  this  description.  In  England,  we  may 
set  it  down  at  3000,  and  this  would  require  200,000  to  convert  the  whole 
quantify.  Allowing  them  to  average  even  £30  each,*  the  wages  would 
amount  to  £6,000,000,  and  the  product  would  be  92,000,000  of  pieces, 
35,000,t300  of  which  would  pay  for  the  cotton,  leaving  57,000,000 

Worth £19,000,000 

From  which  deduct  the  labour  performed,  say,  6,000,000t 

And  there  remain  for  interest,  profits,  &c.,  .  £13,000,000 
In  order  that  large  profits  be  realized,  it  is  necessary  that  the  price  of  the 
raw  material  be  kept  low;  a  state  of  things  which  results  necessarily  from 
the  quantity  requiring  to  be  converted  bearing  a  large  proportion  to  the  ma- 
chinery prepared  for  its  conversion.  The  mode  of  accomplishing  this  is 
simple.  The  first  indication  of  a  tendency  to  rise  in  the  price  is  met  by 

*  The  result  of  careful  inquiry,  in  1833,  gave  10«.  5rf.  as  the  average  of  operatives, 
male  and  female,  mechanics,  engineers,  &c.     This  would  be  £27,  Is.  Sd.  for  the  year 
f  This  is  2|rf.  per  pound,  which  is  much  more  than  the  truth. 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  75 

working  short  hours,  the  effect  of  which  is  to  diminish  the  wages  of  labour  to 
a  point  so  near  the  cost  of  food  and  rent,  and  taxes  on  both,  that  the  power  of 
purchasing  clothing  is  almost  destroyed;  and  therefore  it  is  that  we  see  such 
prodigious  changes  in  home  consumption  whenever  a  small  rise  of  prices 
lakes  place.  The  stock  begins  to  accumuhite,  and  with  its  accumulation 
the  price  falls.  Mills  again  run  full  time,  and  so  they  continue  until  another 
rise  takes  place,  when  the  same  operation  is  performed,  as  is  at  this  moment 
being  the  case. 

The  exchanger,  owner  of  machinery,  thus  stands  between  the  labourer 
who  produces,  and  the  labourer  who  consumes  the  cotton,  fixing  the  price 
for  both,  and  taking  for  himself  the  largest  share;  and  thus  it  is  that  men 
accumulate  colossal  fortunes,  while  surrounded  by  men,  women,  and  children 
living  in  poverty  and  clothed  in  rags.*  Of  the  burden  thus  thrown  upon 

*  Rothschild  may  be  taken  as  the  type  of  the  whole  system,  and  the  following  notice 
of  him  and  of  his  modes  of  taxing  those  by  whom  he  was  surrounded,  furnishes  a  pic- 
ture of  the  speculators  of  every  kind,  in  England,  who  live  at  the  cost  of  the  labourers  of 
the  world  : — 

"The  name  of  Nathan  Meyer  Rothschild  was  in  the  months  of  all  city  men  as  a  pro- 
digy of  success.  Cautiously,  however,  did  the  capitalist  proceed,  until  he  had  made  a 
fortune  as  great  as  his  future  reputation.  He  revived  all  the  arts  of  an  older  period.  He  em- 
ployed brokers  to  depress  or  raise  the  market  for  his  benefit,  and  is  said  in  one  day  to 
have  purchased  to  the  extent  of  four  millions.  The  name  of  Rothschild  as  contractor  for 
an  English  loan  made  its  first  public  appearance  in  1819.  But  the  twelve  millions  for 
which  he  then  became  responsible  went  to  a  discount.  It  was  said,  however,  that  Mr. 
Rothschild  had  relieved  himself  from  all  liability  before  the  calamity  could  reach  him. 
From  this  year  his  transactions  pervaded  the  entire  globe.  The  Old  and  the  New  World 
alike  bore  witness  to  his  skill ;  and  with  the  profits  of  a  single  loan  he  purchased  an  es- 
tate which  cost  jElSO.OOO.  Minor  capitalists,  like  parasitical  plants,  clung  to  him,  and 
were  always  ready  to  advance  their  money  in  speculations  at  his  bidding.  Nothing 
seemed  too  gigantic  for  his  grasp;  nothing  too  minute  for  his  notice.  His  mind  was  as 
capable  of  calculating  a  loan  for  millions  as  of  calculating  the  lowest  possible  amount  on 
which  a  clerk  could  exist.  Like  too  many  great  merchants,  whose  profits  were  counted  by 
thousands,  he  paid  his  assistants  the  smallest  amount  for  which  he  could  procure  Ihem.  He  be- 
came the  high-priest  of  the  temple  of  Janus,  and  the  coupons  raised  by  the  capitalist  for 
a  despotic  state  were  more  than  a  match  for  the  cannon  of  the  revolutionist. 

"From  most  of  the  speculations  of  1824  and  1825,  Mr.  Rothschild  kept  wisely  aloof. 
The  Alliance  Life  and  Fire  Assurance  Company,  which  owes  its  origin  to  this  period,  was, 
however,  produced  under  his  auspices,  and  its  great  success  is  a  proof  of  his  forethought 
None  of  the  loans  with  which  he  was  connected  were  ever  repudiated ;  and  when  the 
crash  of  that  sad  period  came,  the  great  Hebrew  looked  coldly  and  calmly  on,  and  con- 
gratulated himself  on  his  caution.  At  his  counting-house,  a  fair  price  might  be  procured 
for  any  amount  of  stock,  which,  at  a  critical  time,  would  have  depressed  the  public  market; 
and  it  was  no  uncommon  circumstance  for  brokers  to  apply  at  the  office  of  Mr.  Rothschild, 
instead  of  going  in  the  Stock  Exchange.  He  has,  however,  been  occasionally  surpassed 
iii  cunning ;  and  on  one  occasion  a  great  banker  lent  Rothschild  a  million  and  a  half  on 
^>e  security  of  consols,  the  price  of  which  was  then  84.  The  terms  on  which  the  money 
»vas  lent  were  simple.  If  the  price  reached  74,  the  banker  might  claim  the  stock  at  70; 
Dut  Rothschild  felt  satisfied  that,  with  so  large  a  sum  out  of  the  market,  the  bargain  was 
i-olerably  safe.  The  banker,  however,  as  much  a  Jew  as  Rothschild,  had  a  plan  of  his 
cwn.  He  immediately  began  selling  the  consols  received  from  the  latter,  together  with  a 
similar  amount  in  his  own  possession.  The  funds  dropped;  the  Stock  Exchange  grew 
alarmed;  other  circumstances  tended  to  depress  it;  the  fatal  price  of  74  was  reached; 
and  the  Christian  banker  had  the  satisfaction  of  outwitting  the  Hebrew  loanmonger. 
But,  if  sometimes  outwitted  himself,  there  is  little  doubt  he  made  others  pay  for  it; 
and,  on  one  occasion,  it  is  reported  that  his  finesse  proved  too  great  for  the  authorities  of 
the  Bank  of  England.  Mr.  Rothschild  was  in  want  of  bullion,  and  went  to  the  governoi 
to  procure  on  lojm  a  portion  of  the  superfluous  store.  His  wishes  were  met;  the  terms 
were  agreed  on;  the  period  was  named  for  its  return;  and  the  affair  finished  for  the 
time.  The  gold  was  used  by  the  financier;  his  end  was  answered,  and  the  day  arrived 
on  which  he  was  to  return  the  borrowed  metal.  Punctual  to  the  time  appointed,  Mr. 
Rothschild  entered ;  and  those  who  remember  his  personal  appearance  nay  in  agine  tht 


76  THE    HARMONY   OF    INTERESTS. 

the  planter  much  goes  to  the  payment  of  taxes  for  the  maintenance  of  those 
who  are  reduced  by  the  system  to  a  state  of  pauperism — much  to  the  govern- 
ment, which  taxes  every  note,  bill  or  bond  —  servants,  horses,  carriages, 
&c.  &c.  Vast  sums  go  to  the  maintenance  of  lawyers  and  conveyancers,  to 
that  of  stock-gamblers  and  speculators,  and  much  is  lost  by  failures  of  every 
kind,  the  natural  results  of  a  gambling  trade.  The  result  is,  that  the 
cotton  which  yields  the  planter,  on  his  plantation,  but  five  cents  per 
pound,  and  is  sold  in  Liverpool  at  four-pence  halfpenny  per  pound, 
is  sold  by  the  mill  owner  at  a  shilling,*  and  yet  the  reward  of  the  la- 
bour employed  in  converting  it  into  cloth  is  not  twopence,  and  probably 
little  more  than  a  penny  per  pound.  It  is  so  obviously  the  interest  of  mill 
owners  to  obtain  large  allowances  for  the  use  of  machinery,  that  it  cannot  be 
doubted  they  will  continue  to  pursue  this  course,  and  to  make  every  effort 
that  may  be  necessary  to  continue  to  themselves  the  control  of  the  cotton 
market.  That  control  depends  upon  continuing  the  monopoly  of  machinery; 
and  the  moment  that  monopoly  shall  be  broken  up,  and  machinery  shall 
become  so  abundant  elsewhere  as  to  relieve  the  planter  from  the  necessity 
for  seeking  a  market,  the  power  of  taxation  will  pass  away,  cloth  will  be 
cheap,  consumption  will  be  trebled,  and  the  producer  will  grow  rich. 

We  may  now,  for  a  moment,  look  to  the  manner  in  which  the  sugar-planter 
is  taxed.  The  quantity  of  sugar  entered  for  home  consumption  in  1847  was 
6,800,000  cwt.,  and  the  average  price  was  about  25s.  per  cwt.,  of  which 
at  least  one-fourth,  and  very  probably  one-third,  went  to  pay  the  cost  of  trans- 
portation in  and  from  India,  the  Isle  of  France,  Brazil,  Cuba,  Jamaica,  &c., 
storage,  commission,  &c. 

Allowing  it  to  have  been  three-tenths,  the  planter  had  at  his  command 
about  £5,000000 

The  price  of  iron  was  £9,  12s.  and  if  we  now  add  to  this  for 
the  transportation  to  Cuba,  Brazil,  India,  &c.,  and  from  the 
port  to  the  plantation,  only  £l,8s.  we  have  £1]  as  the  cost 
of  a  ton,  at  which  rate  450,000  tons  would  amount  to  £4,950,000 

and  if  the  account  were  more  accurately  made  up,  it  would  not  probably 
amount  to  400,000  tons. 

To  add  that  quantity  in  a  single  year  to  the  product  of  iron  in  this  country, 
would  not  require  the  slightest  exertion,  and  yet  we  see  here  that  in  return 
for  it,  small  as  it  was,  England  obtained,  in  1847,  more  than  one-fourth  of 
the  products  of  the  labour  of  all  the  sugar-producing  countries  of  the  globe  ! 
A  very  slight  examination  of  this  statement  will  show  in  whaj:  manner  the 
people  of  the  world  are  taxed  for  the  maintenance  of  iron-manufacturers, 
railroad  speculators,  and  the  host  of  middle-men,  with  whom  England  so 
much  abounds.  Her  producers  are  few,  and  her  consumers  are  many,  and 
the  materials  for  their  consumption  are  obtained  by  means  of  a  system  of 
taxation  the  most  extraordinary  that  the  world  has  yet  seen. 

The  object  of  protection  is  not  only  to  rescue  ourselves  from  the  necessity 
of  contributing  to  the  maintenance  of  such  a  system,  but  also  to  facilitate 
the  process  of  emigration  from  lands  so  taxed,  adding  to  the  value  of  the 
people  who  remain,  by  diminishing  the  supply  of  men  in  market,  and  corn- 
cunning  twinkle  of  his  small,  quick  eye,  as,  ushered  into  the  presence  of  the  governor,  ho 
handed  the  borrowed  amount  in  bank  notes.  He  was  reminded  of  his  agreement,  ana 
the  necessity  of  bullion  was  urged.  His  reply  was  worthy  of  a  commercial  Talleyrand. 
'  Very  well,  gentlemen.  Give  me  the  notes.  I  dare  say  your  cashier  will  honour  them 
with  gold  from  your  vaults,  and  then  I  can  return  you  bullion.'  To  such  a  speech,  the 
nnly  worthy  reply  was  a  scornful  silence." 

•  The  piece  which  sold  at  6s.  Id.  required  to  produce  it  about  6J  pounds  of  cottoa 
The  price  was  thus  almost  exactly  a  shilling  per  pound. 


THE    HARMONY   OF    INTERESTS.  77 

pelling  those  who  desire  to  purchase  labour  to  give  for  it  the  proper  equiva- 
lent in  food  and  raiment,  which  now  they  do  not.  With  every  step  in  that 
direction,  their  power  to  produce  iron  and  to  consume  food  and  clothing 
must  grow,  and  the  power  to  maintain  commerce  must  increase. 

We  have  seen  that  iron  was  much  more  costly  in  1845-6  than  from 
1827  to  '34.  In  opposition  to  this  unquestionable  fact,  the  late  Secretary  of 
the  Treasury  asserted  that,  "experience  proves  that  from  improved  ma- 
chinery, new  inventions  and  reduced  cost  of  production,  the  foreign  articles 
are  constantly  diminishing  in  price."*  In  opposition  to  this  we  have  the 
fact  that  not  only  was  iron  higher  but  cotton  was  lower.  The  man 
who  gave  two  pounds  of  cotton  in  1845-6  for  less  iron  than  he  could 
have  had  in  1833-4  for  one,  found  that  the  price  of  iron  was  increasing 
and  not  diminishing,  and  that  it  was  far  more  difficult  than  in  the  former 
period  to  obtain  what  he  needed  for  the  construction  of  machinery.  His 
wages  in  iron  were  thus  reduced,  and  his  power  to  accumulate  capital  was 
reduced ;  whereas,  if  he  had  made  his  exchanges  on  the  spot  with  the  pro- 
ducer of  iron,  both  would  have  grown.  Nevertheless  we  are  told  by  the  same 
authority  that  the  necessary  consequence  of  the  protective  system  is,  that 
"  wages  throughout  the  country  became  lower  than  before,  because  the 
aggregate  profits  of  the  capital  of  the  nation  engaged  in  all  its  industry  is 
diminished."!"  It  is  deemed  most  profitable  to  trade  with  those  nations 
whose  labour  is  low,  and  the  lower  it  is  "  the  greater  is  our  gain  in  the  ex- 
change." The  labour  of  Great  Britain  is  lower  than  it  was  fifteen  years 
since,  because  it  is  less  productive,  and  the  less  her  people  produce,  the  less 
they  have  to  give  us  in  exchange  for  our  products;  the  consequence  of  which 
is,  that  we  give  more  cotton  for  less  iron.  If  all  the  people  of  England  were 
to  work,  they  would  produce  far  more  cloth  and  iron ;  wages  would  then 
rise,  and  the  equivalent  of  a  bale  of  cotton  in  iron  would  be  doubled.  The 
more  productively  the  people  of  the  world  are  employed,  the  greater  will  be 
the  value  of  their  labour,  and  the  larger  will  be  the  quantity  of  good  things 
that  we  shall  obtain  in  exchange  for  our  labour.  The  larger  their  armies, 
the  more  destructive  their  wars,  the  more  numerous  their  revolutions,  the 
more  their  money-spending  classes,  paupers  and  noblemen,  abound,  the  smaller 
will  be  the  value  of  labour  abroad,  the  smaller  will  be  their  power  to  main- 
tain commerce,  and  the  smaller  will  be  the  advantage  to  those  who  trade 
with  them ;  for  the  less  silk  or  iron  they  produce,  the  more  food  or  cotton 
must  be  given  them  as  the  equivalent  of  similar  quantities. 

The  document  to  which  I  have  above  referred  belongs  to  the  school  of 
discords ;  that  which  teaches  to  buy  in  the  cheapest  and  sell  in  the  dearest 
market,  and  sees  great  advantage  to  be  gained  by  reducing  the  cotton  of 
the  poor  Hindoo  to  a  penny^a  pound,  careless  of  the  fact  that  famine  and 
pestilence  follow  in  the  train  of  such  a  system.  The  policy  that  produces 
a  necessity  for  depending  on  trade  with  people  who  are  poorer  than  our- 
selves tends  to  reduce  the  wages  of  our  labour  to  a  level  with  theirs,  and  to 
diminish  commerce.  That  which  should  give  us  power  to  trade  with  na- 
tions who  might  be  richer  than  ourselves  would  tend  to  raise  our  wages  to 
a  level  with  theirs.  By  bringing  the  Irishman  here,  and  enabling  him  to 
make  his  exchanges  with  us,  we  raise  him  to  our  level  as  a  producer.  By 
exporting  our  people  to  Ireland,  and  compelling  them  to  make  their  exchanges 
there,  we  should  sink  their  wages  to  a  level  with  those  of  that  country. 
The  policy  that  brings  people  here  and  raises  them  in  the  scale  of  civiliza- 
tion, is  that  which  promotes  commerce.  That  which  causes  them  to  return 
home,  and  thus  arrests  the  tide  of  immigration,  preventing  advance  iu 
civilization,  is  the  one  which  diminishes  commerce. 

•  Report,  December,  1S48  f  Ibid. 


78  THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 


CHAPTER  SEVENTH. 

HOW  PROTECTION  AFFECTS  THE  QUANTITY  AND  QUALITY  OF  THE  MACHINERY 

OF  PRODUCTION. 

THE  object  sought  to  be  accomplished  is  the  improvement  of  the  condition 
of  man.  The  mode  by  which  it  is  to  be  accomplished  is  that  of  increasing 
his  productive  power.  The  more  food  a  man  can  raise,  the  more  and  better 
food  may  he  consume,  and  the  larger  will  be  the  surplus  that  can  be  appro- 
priated to  the  purchase  of  clothing,  to  the  education  of  his  family,  to  the  en- 
largement of  his  house,  or  to  the  improvement  of  his  machinery,  and  the 
greater  will  be  the  amount  of  leisure  that  can  be  appropriated  to  the  im- 
provement of  his  modes  of  thought. 

The  better  his  machinery,  and  the  more  readily  it  can  be  obtained,  the 
larger  will  be  his  production.  Machinery  consists  chiefly  of  iron,  and  the 
more  readily  that  can  be  obtained,  the  more  rapid  will  be  the  increase  of 
production  and  the  improvement  of  the  physical,  moral,  intellectual  and 
political  capacities  of  man.  It  is  the  great  instrument  of  civilization. 

The  more  durable  his  work,  the  more  rapidly  will  his  capital  increase. 
Where  iron  is  abundant  it  is  substituted  for  wood  in  the  building  of  houses. 
which  are  thus  secured  from  fire,  and  in  the  construction  of  ships  and  roads,  by 
which  transportation  is  improved — and  with  each  such  step  his  powers  of 
production  are  increased. 

That  he  may  obtain  iron  readily,  he  must  have  the  command  of  fuel,  ob- 
tainable at  moderate  cost  of  labour — in  other  words,  cheaply — for  things  are 
cheap  or  dear  not  in  proportion  to  their  money-price,  but  to  the  quantity  of 
labour  required  for  obtaining  them.  The  money-price  of  grain,  in  Ireland, 
is  less  than  in  England,  yet  the  cost  in  labour  is  so  great  that  the  poor  cul- 
tivator eats  still  poorer  potatoes.  The  money-price  of  coal  is  less  than  it 
was  two  ye(ars  since,  yet  the  consumption  has  diminished,  because  the 
labour-price  has  risen.  The  money-price  of  cotton  in  those  parts  of  India 
in  which  it  is  raised,  is  about  two  cents  per  pound,  yet  the  man  who  raises 
it  covers  his  loins  with  a  rag,  dispensing  with  clothing  for  the  rest  of  his 
body,  because  the  labour-price  of  cloth  is  great.  Where  production  is 
small,  the  labour-price  of  commodities  is  high,  and  consumption  is  very 
small;  and  vice  versa,  where  production  is  large,  the  labour-price  of  com 
rnodities  is  low,  and  consumption  is  great. 

Large  production  requires  good  and  cheap  machinery,  and  that  we  may 
obtain  such  machinery,  we  must  have  good  and  cheap  fuel.  Abundance 
of  fuel  and  iron  are  the  foundation  upon  which  civilization  must  rest,  and 
whatever  the  course  of  policy  that  tends  most  to  facilitate  their  acquisition, 
that  is  the  one  which  must  tend  most  rapidly  to  augment  the  productive  power 
of  man,  and  to  increase  his  power  and  his  capacity  for  improvement. 

Iron  ore  and  fuel  exist  throughout  this  country  in  such  profusion  as  is 
elsewhere  unknown.  Nowhere  in  the  world  can  they  be  so  readily  ob- 
tained—nowhere so  easily  brought  into  combination  with  each  other.  'The 
anthracite  of  Pennsylvania  is  the  best  fuel  in  the  world,  and  it  can  be  mined 
as  cheaply  as  any  other.  It  is  interstrati'fied  with  iron  ore  in  great  abun- 
dance. Limestone  abounds  close  to  the  great  Schuylkill  region,  and 
it  may  be  obtained  with  as  little  labour  as  anywhere  in  the  world.  The 
ores  and  fuel  of  Ohio  and  the  West  are  thus  described  : — 

The  beds  of  ore  are  easy  of  access,  beinj;  and  associated  with  materials  necessary  for  its  re- 
duction, cannot  fail  to  be  of  immense  sources  of  wealth.  Most  of  the  working-beds  of 
ore  are  above  the  first  workable  bed  of  coal.  The  amount  of  workable  ore  in  Muskingum 
county  is  estimated  at  153,600,000  cubic  yards,  which,  when  melted,  will  yield  about 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  79 

half  that  number  of  tons,  in  pigs.  We  need  not  now  speak  of  localities.  Mr.  Brigga 
closes  his  report  on  iron  ore  as  follows  : — "  A  very  low  calculation  of  the  amount  of  good 
iron  ore  in  the  region  which  has  this  season  been  explored,  is  equal  to  a  solid,  unbroken 
stratum,  sixty  miles  in  length,  sixty  miles  in  width,  and  three  feet  in  thickness.  A  square 
mile  of  this  layer,  being  equivalent  in  round  numbers  to  three  millions  cubic  yards,  when 
melted,  will  yield  as  many  tons  of  pig  iron.  This  number,  multiplied  by  the  number  of 
square  miles  in  the  stratum,  will  give  1,080,000.000  tons ;  which,  from  three  counties 
alone,  will  yield  annually,  for  2700  years,  400,000  tons  of  iron — more  than  equal  to  the 
greatest  amount  made  in  England  previous  to  the  year  1829.'' — Ohio  Paper. 

The  country  bordering  on  Carp  River  (Lake  Superior)  is,  perhaps,  the  richest  on  the 
globe  for  its  iron  ore.  The  "Jackson  Iron  Company,"  whose  location  we  had  the 
pleasure  of  visiting,  is  situated  some  twelve  miles  from  the  Lake  Shore,  and  about  three 
miles  from  the  iron  mountains.  One  of  these  mountains  belongs  to  the  above-named 
company,  and  the  other  to  the  "  Cleveland  Iron  Company."  .These  two  mountains,  as  we 
were  informed,  are  by  far  the  richest  and  most  valuable  of  any  iron  deposit  that  have 
been  discovered — though  it  is  said  that  more  or  less  iron  ore  is  found  spread  over  some 
seventeen  or  eighteen  townships  between  Lake  Superior  and  Green  Bay.  This  ore  con- 
tains from  75  to  90  per  cent,  of  pure  iron,  and  metal  made  from  it  by  the  Jackson  Com- 
pany has  been  submitted  to  the  severest  tests,  and  proves  to  be  of  the  very  best  quality 
of  iron  that  is  made  in  any  part  of  the  world,  having  been  drawn  down  to  the  size  of 
No.  30  wire.  The  Jackson  Iron  Company  (under  the  superintendence  of  P.  M.  Everett, 
Esq.,  who  we  now  understand  leaves,  and  is  succeeded  by  Czar  Jones,  Esq.,  of  Jackson) 
has  been  making  iron  for  some  twelve  or  eighteen  months. — Lake  Superior  News. 

Such  being  the  case,  we  might  suppose  that  the  consumption  of  fuel  and 
iron  would  be  great,  but  such  has  not  been  the  case. 

In  1810,  the  domestic  manufacture  amounted  to  only  50,000  tons.  In 
1828,  it  had  reached  100,000.  In  1818,  '19,  '20,  it  may  perhaps  have 
reached  70,000,  but  even  that  is  very  doubtful.  The  total  importation  of  bar 
and  pig  iron  in  those  years  was  40,000  tons,  or  13,333  per  annum.  The 
import  of  manufactured  articles  of  iron  may  have  been  half  as  much,  and 
this  would  give  a  consumption  of  90,000  tons,  or  200,000,000  of  pounds  for 
apopulation  of  9,400,000  persons, beinga  little  over  20  pounds  per  head.  The 
average  consumption  of  the  Union  for  all  purposes,  for  house-building  and 
ship-building,  for  agricultural  implements,  and  for  machinery  of  every  de- 
scription, was  equal,  therefore,  to  little  more  than  twice  the  weight  of 
an  axe  per  head  per  annum,  and  yet  there  existed,  as  there  now  exists,  a 
capacity  to  produce  iron  at  less  cost  of  labour  than  anywhere  in  the  world. 
If  we'  desire  now  to  understand  the  cause  of  this,  it  maybe  found  in  the  fact 
that  up  to  the  Revolution,  the  manufacture  of  iron,  even  that  of  horse-shoe 
nails,  was  prohibited,  and  there  existed  no  inducement  to  erect  works  for  the 
smelting  of  the  ore,  when  the  pig  could  not  be  used.  The  consequence  was, 
that  it  did  not  grow  with  its  natural  growth,  while  that  of  England  was 
forced  forward,  and  when  the  day  of  nominal  independence  arrived,  that  of 
real  independence  was  still  far  distant.  Under  the  various  tariffs  from  1789 
to  1812,  the  duties  were  ad-valorem,  commencing  with  7  3  per  cent,  and 
gradually  rising  until  they  had  attained,  before  the  war  of  1812,  17£  per 
cent.  The  production  of  iron  had  made  no  progress,  and  the  whole  supply 
had  to  be  sought  abroad,  the  consequence  of  which  was  that  it  was  scarce 
and  dear.  Embargo,  non-intercourse,  and  war  raised  the  price  so  high  that 
furnaces  were  built  in  considerable  numbers  ;  but  with  the  peace,  the  duties 
on  manufactured  iron  were  reduced  to  20  per  cent.  The  demand  for  pig 
iron  was  thus  diminished,  and  the  price  in  Pittsburgh,  which  had  been  $60, 
fell  in  1820  and  1821  to  §20,  the  consequence  of  which  was  the  ruin  of 
nearly  all  engaged  in  its  production.  This,  however,  was  not  a  consequence 
of  reduction  of  duty.  At  that  very  time  the  duty  on  pigs  was  $10,  and  on 
bars  830  per  ton,  and  thus  the  selling  price  at  that  place  was  far  less  than 
the  freight  and  duty  on  imported  iron.  Iron  was  nominally  cheap,  but 


80  THE    HARMONY    OF   INTERESTS. 

really  dear:  so  dear  that  consumption  was  destroyed.  Labour  was  at  S6 
per  month,  and  wheat  sold  for  25  cents  a  bushel,  and  thus  was  produced  so 
total  an  inability  to  consume  this  most  necessary  of  all  commodities,  that  al- 
though the  furnaces  were  closed,  the  whole  import  of  pig  and  rolled  iron  in 
1821,  was  but  4000  tons,  or  one  ton  to  every  2,500  persons.  It  may  be 
doubted  if  the  consumption  of  that  year  exceeded  six  pounds  per  head. 
We  see  thus  that  the  power  to  import  disappeared  with  the  power  to  pro- 
iluce,  as  has  already  been  shown  to  have  been  the  case  on  other  occasions. 

Who,  now,  were  the  losers  by  the  greatly  increased  difficulty  of  obtaining 
this  great  instrument  of  civilization  ?  To  answer  this  question,  we  must 
first  inquire  who  are  the  great  consumers  of  iron  ?  The  farmers  and  planters 
constitute  three-fourths  of  the  population  of  the  nation,  and  if  the  loss  were 
equally  distributed,  that  portion  of  the  loss  would  fall  upon  them  ;  but  we 
shall  find  upon  inquiry  that  it  is  upcn  them,  the  producers  of  all  we  con- 
sume, that  the  whole  of  it  must  fall. 

The  farmer  needs  iron  for  his  spades  and  ploughs,  his  shovels  and  his 
dung-forks,  his  trace-chains  and  horse-shoes,  and  his  wagon-wheels;  for  his 
house,  his  barn,  and  his  stable.  He  needs  them,  too,  for  his  timber.  If 
iron  be  abundant,  saws  are  readily  obtained,  and  the  saw-miller  takes  his 
place  by  his  side,  and  he  has  his  timber  converted  into  plank  at  the  cost  of  less 
labour  than  was  before  required  to  haul  the  logs  to  the  distant  saw-mill.  He 
obtains  the  use  of  mill-saws  cheap.  If  iron  be  abundant,  the  grist-mill 
comes  to  his  neighbourhood,  and  now  he  has  his  grain  converted  into  flour, 
giving  for  the  work  less  grain  than  was  before  consumed  by  the  horses  and 
men  employed  in  carrying  it  to  the  distant  mill.  If  iron  be  abundant, 
spades  and  picks  are  readily  obtained,  and  the  roads  are  mended,  and  he 
passes  more  readily  to  the  distant  market.  If  iron  increase  in  abundance, 
the  railroad  enables  him  to  pass  with  increased  facility,  himself,  his  turnips 
and  potatoes,  to  markets  from  which  before  he  was  entirely  shut  out  by  cost 
of  transportation,  except  as  regarded  articles  of  small  bulk  and  much  value — 
wheat  and  cotton.  If  iron  be  abundant,  the  woollen-mill  comes,  and  his 
wool  is  converted  on  the  spot  by  men  who  eat  on  the  ground  his  cabbages 
and  his  veal,  and  drink  his  milk,  and  perform  the  work  of  conversion  in  re- 
turn for  services  and  things  that  would  have  been  lost  had  they  not  been  thus 
consumed.  At  each  step  he  gets  the  use  of  iron  cheaper — that  is,  at  less 
cost  of  labour.  If  iron  be  abundant,  the  cotton-mill  now  comes,  and  the 
iron  read  now  brings  the  cotton,  and  his  sons  and  his  daughters  obtain  the 
use  of  iron  spindles  and  iron  looms  by  which  they  are  enabled  to  clothe 
themselves  at  one-twentieth  of  the  cost  of  labour  that  had  been  necessary 
but  twenty  years  before.  Instead  of  a  yard  of  cotton  received  in  return  for 
two  bushels  of  corn,  one  bushel  of  corn  pays  for  six  yards  of  cloth — and  now 
it  is  that  the  farmer  grows  rich. 

A  careful  examination  of  society  will  satisfy  the  inquirer  that  all  the 
people  engaged  in  the  work  of  transportation,  conversion,  and  exchange, 
are  but  the  agents  of  the  producers,  and  live  out  of  the  commodities  they 
produce,  and  that  the  producers  grow  rich  or  remain  poor  precisely  as  they 
are  required  to  employ  less  or  more  persons  in  the  making  of  their  ex- 
changes. The  farmer  who  is  compelled  to  resort  to  the  distant  mill  em- 
ploys many  persons,  horsey  and  wagons,  in  the  work  of  converting  his  grain 
into  flour,  and  his  land  is  of  small  value.  Bring  the  mill  clcse  to  him,  and 
a  single  horse  and  cart,  occasionally  employed,  will  do  the  work.  The 
farmer  who  employs  the  people  of  England  to  produce  his  iron,  is  obliged 
to  have  the  services  of  numerous  persons,  of  ships  and  wagons,  and  horses,  tc 
aid  in  the  work.  Bring  the  furnace  to  his  side,  and  let  his  neighbour  get  out 
his  iron,  and  he  and  his  sons  do  much  of  the  work  themselves,  furnishing 


THE   HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  81 

timber,  ore,  and  the  use  of  horses,  wagons,  &c.,  when  not  needed  on  the 
farm. 

The  man  of  Tennessee  sends  to  i  mrket  300  bushels  of  corn,  for  which 
he  receives  in  return  one  ton  of  iron,  the  money-cost  of  which  is  $60,  but 
the  labour-cost  of  which  is  the  cultivation  of  ten  acres  of  land.  If  he 
could  follow  his  corn,  he.  would  find  that  the  men  who  get  out  his  iron 
receive  but  30  or  40  bushels,  and  that  the  remaining  260  or  270  arc  swal- 
lowed up  by  the  numerous  transporters  and  exchangers  that  stand  between 
himself  and  the  men  whom  he  thus  employs.  If,  now,  he  could  bring 
those  men  to  his  side,  giving  them  double  wages,  say  sixty  bushels  of  corn, 
he  would  be  a  gainer  to  the  extent  of  240  bushels.  While  he  has  to  give 
300  bushels,  his  iron  is  dear,  and  he  can  use  little.  When  he  obtains  it  for 
60  bushels  it  is  cheap,  and  he  uses  much.  His  production  increases,  and 
his  ability  to  use  iron  increases  with  it,  and  the  demand  for  workers  in  iron 
increases,  and  all  obtain  food  more  readily,  the  consequence  of  which  is  that 
they  have  more  to  spare  for  clothing,  and  for  other  of  the  comforts  or  the 
luxuries  of  life. 

Whenever  there  is  in  market  a  surplus  of  any  commodity,  the  whole 
quantity  tends  to  fall  to  the  level  of  the  lowest  price  required  to  enable  the 
holders  to  find  purchasers,  and  so  Jong  as  we  shall  continue  to  have  a  sur- 
plus of  food  for  export,  the  price  of  the  whole  must  continue  to  be  regulated 
by  that  which  can  be  obtained  for  the  trivial  quantity  sent  to  Liverpool. 

Whenever  it  is  necessary  to  resort  to  distant  places  to  procure  a  part  of 
the  supply  of  any  commodity,  the  price  of  the  whole  is  regulated  by  the 
cost  of  obtaining  this  last  small  portion.  In  1847,  we  produced  800,000 
tons  of  iron,  yet  the  demand  was  so  much  in  advance  of  the  supply  that  we 
were  obliged  to  import  a  small  quantity,  and  the  price  at  which  that  was 
obtained  fixed  the  price  of  the  whole.  The  farmer  is  thus  always  selling 
in  the  cheapest  and  buying  in  the  dearest  market.  The  labour  and  capital 
required  to  produce  a  ton  of  iron,  are  not  as  great  as  are  needed  for  the  pro- 
duction of  forty  bushels  of  corn,  and  yet  he  gives  for  it  three  hundred,  be- 
cause of  the  quantity  of  labour  wasted  in  transporting  the  one  to  the  man  who 
produces  the  other. 

The  prices  of  labour  and  iron  are  both  higher  than  in  Europe,  and  there- 
fore we  import  both.  The  price  of  food  is  lower  than  in  Europe,  and  there- 
fore we  export  it.  Whenever  the  import  of  labour  shall  be  such  as  to  do 
away  with  the  necessity  for  exporting  food,  as  food,  its  price  will  be  high, 
and  we  shall  cease  to  export  it.  Whenever  the  import  of  men  shall  be  such 
as  to  do  away  with  the  necessity  for  importing  iron,  the  price  will  be  low, 
and  we  shall  export  food  in  the  form  of  iron.  By  the  same  operation  the 
farmer  will  thus  be  enabled  to  obtain  high  prices  for  his  grain,  and  to  buy 
his  iron  cheap.  He  will  then  buy  in  the  cheapest  and  sell  in  the  dearest 
market,  and  the  value  of  his  labour  will  be  increased. 

We  have  seen  that  in  the  period  that  elapsed  between  1821  and  1829,  em- 
bracing the  six  years  which  followed  the  passage  of  the  act  of  1824,  the  con- 
sumption of  iron  rose  to  about  25  pounds  per  head.  In  the  three  following 
years,  under  the  tariff  of  1828,  it  rose  to  47.  By  the  Compromise  Act,  the 
duty  on  railroad  iron  was  abolished,  and  the  consequence  was,  that  the  power 
of  consumption  diminished,  remaining  at  an  average  of  but  40  pounds  for  the 
next  nine  years.  Under  the  strictly  revenue  clauses  of  the  tariff  it  fell 
to  38  pounds,  being  less  than  the  consumption  of  eleven  years  before.  By 
1846,  it  had  risen  to  94,  and  in  the  following  year  it  rose  to  98.  Who  were  the 
persons  that  benefited  by  this  change  ?  Let  us  see.  The  abundance  of  iron 
facilitated  the  opening  of  coal  mines  by  means  of  steam-engines  and  other 
machinery,  and  the  making  of  roads,  by  means  of  which  coal,  and  fool, 


THE    HARMONY    OF   INTERESTS. 


and  timber  could  be  taken  to  market,  and  thus  greatly  diminished  the  number 
of  persons  intermediate  between  the  producer  and  consumer ;  and  the  abund 
ancc  of  fuel  and  iron  facilitated  the  construction  of  steamboats,  diminish- 
ing greatly  the  cost  of  transportation  to  and  from  market ;  and  facilitated 
the  construction  of  mills  and  furnaces,  at  which  the  farmers  and  planters  could 
make  their  own  exchanges  ;  while  the  increased  facility  of  obtaining  ploughs 
and  harrows,  spades  and  axes,  tended  to  increase  the  productiveness  of  labour, 
with  large  increase  in  the  quantities  to  be  exchanged,  and  in  this  manner 
the  whole  benefit  resulting  from  the  augmented  facility  of  obtaining  iron  went 
to  the  cultivators  of  the  land,  farmers  and  planters. 

But  why  should  protection  have  been  necessary  to  produce  this  result1? 
To  the  general  reasons  already  given,  may  now  be  added,  those  which  refer 
particularly  to  iron.  In  a  table  now  before  me,*  the  English  prices  of  mer- 
chant-bar iron  are  thus  given  : — 


£     «. 

£     t.                 £     ». 

1816—11    0(c 

$   8  15 

1827—  9  10 

1817—8  10  (< 

fl3    0 

1828—  9    0 

1818—12    0  Q 

§10    0 

1829—  7  10 

1819—11  10  Q 

in   o 

1830—  6  15 

1820—10  10  Q 

i   9  10 

1831—  6    5 

1821—  9  10  (3 

$   8  15 

1832—  6    5 

1822—  8106 

£   8    0 

1833—  6  15 

1824-13    0(< 

fc   S  15 

1834—  6  10 

1825—15    OQ 

fl  11   10 

1835—  8    5 

1826—11     0£ 

|    9  10 

1836—11  10 

£  t.         £   s. 

S  15 

1837—10  5 

7  15 

1838—  9  10 

6  12 

1839—10  5 

6  5 

1840—  9  0 

5  17 

1841—  7  15 

5  10 

1842—  6  10 

7  15 

1843—  5  0 

7  12 

1844—  6  6 

6  5 

1845—  6  10 

10  5 

1846—  9  0 

We  have  here  £4  10=$21  60,  and  £15=$72,  and  every  price  between. 
Why  should  these  enormous  variations  take  place  1  It  costs  no  more  labour 
to  make  iron  at  one  time  than  at  another.  The  man  who  mined  a  ton  of  ore 
or  coal  in  1832,  when  the  price  was  £510,  could  mine  more  than  a  ton  in 
1846,  because  machinery  had  been  greatly  improved,  and  yet  the  price  was 
then  d£9. 

The  season  may  be  adverse  for  the  growth  of  grain  or  cotton,  and  the  rot 
may  destroy  the  potato  crop,  thus  diminishing  the  quantity  to  be  supplied 
with  great  increase  of  price,  and  yet  neither  food  nor  cotton  is  liable  to  the 
enormous  and  sudden  changes  that  we  see  in  regard  to  iron,  which  ought  to 
be  perfectly  steady.  These  changes  are  due  to  the  unsound  character  of  the 
system,  and  the  perpetual  changes  that  result  therefrom.  The  consequence 
of  them  is,  the  constant  recurrence  of  ruin  to  all,  in  other  countries  engaged 
in  the  manufacture  of  iron.  In  1816  it  was  high,  and  furnaces  were  built.  In 
1821,  it  was  low,  and  iron-masters  were  everywhere  ruined.  In  1825  it 
was  high,  and  furnaces  were  again  put  in  blast.  In  1831,  furnace-masters 
were  again  ruined.  In  1836  it  was  high,  and  in  1842,  it  was  low,  and  on 
both  occasions  the  same  operations  were  repeated.  So  again  in  1846,  furnaces 
were  built,  and  now,  in  1849,  they  are  being  closed. 

The  consequence  of  this  is  that  the  iron  manufacture  throughout  the 
country  is  in  a  barbarous  condition.  Small  furnaces  abound,  at  which  much 
labour  is  given  to  producing  little  iron.  At  each  forced  intermission  of  the 
exertions  of  England  to  maintain  the  monopoly  of  the  production  of  this  im- 
portant commodity,  we  can  see  it  making  its  way  gradually  to  the  land 
where  alone  it  can  be  produced  at  small  cost  of  labour — that  land  where  ore, 
coal  and  limestone  are  interstratified  with  each  other,  and  at  which  it  would 
long  since  have  arrived  but  for  our  frequent  changes  of  policy. 

•  Merchants'  Magazine,  Vol.  XX.  p.  337. 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  83 

Very  little  examination  is  necessary  to  satisfy  the  inquirer  that  it  has  been 
precisely  when  iron  has  been  lowest  in  England,  in  1822  and  1843,  that 
our  consumption  was  least ;  and  it  is  now  diminishing  rapidly,  as  our  furnaces 
are  being  closed  and  their  owners  ruined.  The  power  to  consume  derline* 
daily.  With  another  year  or  two  the  price  abroad  will  be  high,  but  tima 
will  then  be  required  to  get  the  old  furnaces  into  operation,  and  still 
longer  to  build  new  ones;  for  iron-making  is  like  buying  lottery  tickets, 
and  the  blanks  are  more  numerous  than  the  prizes.  That  time  arrived, 
pig  iron  may  be  again  $40  and  bars  880  per  ton. 

So  long  as  a  nation  is  dependent  on  England  for  any  portion  of  its  supply, 
so  long  must  prices  continue  to  be  thus  variable,  and  so  long  must  the  con- 
sumption of  this  important  article,  and  the  facilities  for  producing  it,  be 
small,  and  all  the  deficiency  falls  on  the  producer  of  food,  or  wool,  or  cotton ;  for 
it  is  he  that  pays  the  cost  of  transportation,  conversion  and  exchange.  The 
consumption  of  the  present  year  will  not,  probably,  exceed  700,000  tons,  for 
the  make  at  home  is  greatly  diminished,  and  the  stock  on  hand  has  increased 
to  an  extent  nearly  approaching  that  of  the  import  from  abroad.  Next  year, 
there  is  strong  reason  for  believing  that  it  will  be  still  farther  diminished, 
whereas,  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  that  year,  had  the  system  of  1842  remained 
unchanged,  would  have  seen  the  domestic  product  attain  1,300,000  tons,  or 
3,000,000,000  of  pounds,  being  125  pounds  per  head  j  the  increase  for  1846 
having  been  almost  equal  to  the  whole  consumption,  per  head,  in  1842-3. 
Thenceforth,  the  price  would  have  been  regulated  by  the  cost  of  production 
here,  and  not  by  the  fluctuations  of  policy  abroad  ;  and  thenceforth  the  prices 
would  have  been  daily  diminishing,  as  the  machinery  of  production  improved. 
The  object  of  the  colonial  system  is  that  of  increasing  the  number  of  trans- 
porters, converters  and  exchangers,  who  are  to  be  supported  out  of  the 
labours  of  the  farmers  and  planters.  The  object  of  the  protective  system  is 
to  diminish  the  number;  and  the  question  now  to  be  settled  is,  whether 
the  labourers,  the  men  who  produce  all  that  we  consume,  or  the  exchangers 
shall  be  masters.  Were  the  latter  to  succeed,  we  should  have  perfect 
freedom  of  trade,  so  far  as  freedom  consists  in  being  compelled  to  forego 
the  association  of  men  with  their  fellow-men  for 'the  improvement  of 
their  condition,  and  the  result  would  be  the  stoppage  of  every  furnace 
in  the  Union;  when  all  those  engaged  in  mining  coal  and  ore  would  be 
compelled  to  resort  to  the  raising  of  food,  which  would  be  lower,  while 
iron  would  be  higher  and  greatly  higher.  Its  cost  in  labour  would  be  so  far 
increased  that  consumption  would  fall  to  the  point  at  which  it  stood  in  1821. 
Perfect  protection  would  soon  quadruple  our  production,  and  vast  num- 
bers of  persons  would  mine  iron  and  coal  instead  of  raising  food,  which 
would  be  higher.  The  labour-cost  of  iron  would  be  diminished,  and  the 
consumption  would  be  increased;  and  it  is  by  aid  of  iron  that  production  is  to 
be  increased,  exchanges  facilitated,  conversion  improved,  land  increased  in 
value,  and  farmers  and  planters  made  rich. 


From  1829  to  1832,  the  domestic  production  increased  about  fifty  per  cent. 
During  the  whole  of  that  period,  the  Union  was  agitated  by  threats  of 
nullification  and  disunion,  and  there  existed  no  motive  for  investing  in  fur- 
naces or  rolling-mills  the  large  amounts  required  for  the  cheap  production  of 
this  important  commodity.  From  1842  to  1847,  the  production  trebled,  and 
perhaps  quadrupled.  During  the  intermediate  period  it  was  almost  stationary 

I  propose  to  inquire  what  would  have  been  the  result,  had  the  production  gone 
on  to  increase  at  the  rate  of  only  15  per  cent,  per  annum,  and  then  to  examine 
what  would  have  been  the  effect  on  the  working  men,  the  planters  and 


84  THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 

farmers  of  the  Union,  with  a  view  to  ascertain  from  the  experience  of  the 
past  what  is  probably  the  true  course  of  policy  for  the  future. 

Starting  with  200,000  tons  in  1832,  and  increasing  the  product  15  per 
cent,  the  succeeding  years  would  have  been  as  follows : — 

Tears.  1000  tons.  Years.  1000  tona.  Team.  1000  tons. 


1833  .  .  230 

1834  .  .  265 

1835  .  .  305 

1836  .  .  350 

1837  .  .  402 

1838  .  .  462 


1839  .  .  532 

1840  .  .  612 

1841  .  .  704 

1842  .  .  810 

1843  .  .  930 

1844  .  .  1070 


1845  .  .  123d 

1846  .  .  1415 

1847  .  .  1630 

1848  .  .  1875 

1849  .  .  2150 

1850  2472 


It  will  be  seen  that  the  highest  increase  of  any  year  is  scarcely  more  than 
that  which  actually  took  place  in  years  between  1843  and  1847,  when  every 
thinof  had  to  be  recommenced,  after  a  state  of  almost  utter  ruin.  What  now 
would  have  been  the  amount  of  investment  required  for  the  production  of  this 
quantity  of  pig-metal?  A  furnace  capable  of  producing  5000  tons  per  week  may 
cost  830,000.  We  can  now  produce  800,000  tons.  To  have  made  it  2,000,000 
would  have  required  the  building  of  240  furnaces  more  than  we  have  built, 
and  their  construction  would  have  required  $8,000,000,  being  far  less 
than  the  amount  that  has  in  that  period  been  spent  in  building  packet  ships 
to  run  between  New  York,  London,  and  Liverpool, — leaving  out  of  view 
all  other  expenditure  upon  shipping,  whether  for  building  or  sailing 
them.  The  ships  have  disappeared,  or  will  disappear,  leaving  nothing  be- 
hind. The  furnaces  would  be  still  in  existence.  At  one  establishment  in 
Pennsylvania  there  are  six  furnaces  capable  of  producing  800  tons  of  metal 
per  week,  or  41,600  tons  per  annum.  The  cost  of  these  may  have  been 
§200,000.  To  build  ships  capable  of  transporting  that  quantity  would  re 
quire  an  investment  of  at  least  $750,000.  At  the  end  of  a  few  years,  the 
whole  of  that  capital  would  be  sunk,  while  the  furnaces  might  last  almost 
for  centuries.  The  tendency  of  the  colonial  system  is  thus  to  compel  the 
employment  of  capital  in  temporary  machinery,  and  the  object  of  protection 
is  to  enable  the  owner  of  it  to  invest  it  in  that  which  is  permanent. 

It  will  be  asked,  what  should  we  have  done  with  all  this  iron?  In 
answer,  I  say,  that  every  man  is  a  consumer  to  the  full  extent  of  his  pro- 
duction. The  man  who  m'ade  the  iron  would  have  required  food,  fuel  and 
clothing.  The  man  who  mined  the  fuel  would  have  required  iron,  food 
and  clothing.  The  man  who  raised  the  food  would  have  required  iron,  fuel 
and  clothing.  The  man  who  made  the  clothing  would  have  required 
iron,  food  and  fuel.  The  man  who  raised  the  wool  and  the  cotton  would 
have  required  food,  fuel,  iron,  and  clothing.  Production  would  have  largely 
increased,  and  there  would  have  been  a  large  increase  in  the  power  of  con- 
suming all  the  commodities  necessary  for  the  convenience  and  comfort  of 
man.  In  other  words,  there  would  have  been  a  great  increase  in  the  pro- 
fits of  capital  and  the  wages  of  labour. 

Had  production  gone  on  at  the  rate  I  have  indicated,  we  should  havo 
in  the  period  from  1834  to  the  present  time  15,000,000  of  tons,  whereas  we 
have  had  but  5,000,000.  These  10,000,000  would  have  filled  the  country 
with  machinery,  enabling  the  farmers  and  planters  to  have  the  consumers 
by  their  sides,  and  in  addition  would  have  given  them  roads  by  which  to  go 
t-?  market  at  half  the  present  cost.  Their  necessity  for  going  to  distant 
markets  would  have  diminished,  while  their  power  so  to  do  would  have  in- 
crtased,  and  with  ever)'  step  in  this  progress  they  would  have  become 
enriched. 

It  may,  perhaps,  be  said  that  this  demand  for  labour  would  have  dimin- 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  85 

ished  the  power  to  produce  food  and  cotton.  On  the  contrary,  it  would 
have  increased  it.  Two-thirds  of  the  labour  actually  employed  in  the 
making  of  this  iron  and  its  conversion  into  the  various  forms  to  fit  it  for  use, 
would  have  been  saved  labour — labour  that  has  been  wasted.  Further,  the 
farmer  and  planter  would  have  exchanged  their  food  and  cotton  on  the  spot 
for  iron,  and  here  would  have  been  a  further  and  vast  saving  of  labour. 
The  increased  facility  of  obtaining  spades  and  hoes,  ploughs  and  harrows, 
horse-shoes,  carts  and  wagons,  would  have  rendered  the  labour  on  the  farm 
or  plantation  more  productive.  The  rapid  growth  of  railroads  would  have 
prevented  the  necessity  for  going  to  market  with  produce,  and  facilitated 
the  transport  of  manure,  and  marl,  and  lime,  and  thus  the  power  to  apply 
labour  steadily  and  advantageously  would  have  largely  increased.  The 
neighbouring  cotton-mill  or  woollens-mill  would  have  furnished  clothing  for 
food  and  labour,  and  thus  the  necessity  for  looking  to  distant  markets  would 
have  been  diminished,  while  the  power  to  resort  to  them  would  have  largely 
increased.  The  increased  demand  for  labour  and  its  increased  reward, 
would  have  tended  largely  to  augment  immigration,  and  each  new  arrival 
would  have  been  a  mouth  to  be  fed  and  a  back  to  be  clothed,  to  the  advan- 
tage of  both  farmer  and  planter.  Farms  and  plantations  would  have  been 
divided,  and  more  food  and  cotton  would  have  been  obtained  from  small 
ones  than  are  now  obtained  from  large  ones.  The  land  would  have  increased 
in  value,  and  the  farmers  and  planters  would  have  grown  rich  because  of 
increased  production  and  diminished  cost  of  exchange,  and  a  part  of  the  sur- 
plus would  have  been  appropriated  to  the  purchase  of  books  and  news- 
papers, and  musical  instruments  and  pictures,  and  thus  would  intellectual 
have  kept  pace  with  moral  and  physical  improvement.  Instead  of  all  this, 
the  period  from  1835  to  1843  was  one  of  diminished  production  and  in- 
creasing poverty  and  crime,  ending  with  bankruptcy  and  repudiation. 

What  has  been  said  in  regard  to  iron  is  equally  true  in  regard  to  coal,  but 
it  is  unnecessary  to  go  into  detail.  Had  the  tariff  of  1828  been  adopted  as 
the  settled  policy  of  the  nation,  the  consumption  of  anthracite  would  by  this 
time  have  reached  10,000,000  of  tons,  and  the  vast  coal  fields  of  the  West 
would  likewise  be  giving  forth  their  products  by  millions,  and  thus  the 
food  of  the  farm  would  have  been  condensed  into  fuel  and  iron,  fitting  it  for 
transportation,  and  providing  means  of  transportation.  Instead  of  this,  we 
have  had  a  series  of  changes  that  have  involved  in  ruin  almost  all  that  have 
been  largely  interested  in  giving  to  the  nation  the  extraordinary  works  that 
connect  Philadelphia  and  New  York  with  the  great  coal  region  of  Pennsyl- 
vania, and  State  bankruptcy  and  repudiation  have  been  followed  by  that  of 
companies  which  have  done  more  for  the  real  advantage  of  the  Union  than 
any  others  that  have  ever  existed  within  its  limits,  and  all  this  has  been  pro- 
duced by  a  policy  under  which  the  whole  consumption  of  iron  was  reduced 
beloAV  40  pounds  per  head,  when  it  might  Jong  since  have  reached  300. 

Had  the  production  of  iron  and  coal  been  allowed  to  increase,  and  the 
manufacture  of  cotton  to  grow,  we  should  be  now  consuming  a  million  and 
a  half  of  bales  ;  and  had  the  woollens  manufacture  been  allowed  to  grow, 
we  should  now  have  a  hundred  millions  of  sheep,  the  whole  of  whose  wool 
would  be  required  for  our  domestic  consumption,  for  those  who  produce 
largely  consume  largely. 

The  perfect  harmony  of  interests  is  nowhere  more  perfectly  exhibited 
than  in  a  thorough  examination  of  the  course  of  proceeding  in  relation  to 
both  coal  and  iron.  Both  were  heavily  protected  from  1816  to  1824,  but 
neither  grew,  because  the  iron  manufacture,  the  cotton  and  the  woollen 
manufactures,  did  not  grow  ;  and  so  would  it  now  be,  were  iron  and  coal  pro- 
tected at  the  cost  of  cotton  and  wool.  All  wax  and  wane  together,  and  the 


86  THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 

man  who  would  protect  himself  at  the  cost  of  his  neighbour,  makes  a  sad 
mistake.  It  is  useless  to  produce  iron  without  a  market,  and  that  market  is 
to  be  found  in  the  rolling-mill,  the  foundery,  the  machine-shop,  the  cut- 
ler's shop  and  that  of  the  axe-maker,  and  they  in  turn  must  find  a  market 
among  the  producers  of  food,  and  wool,  and  cotton.  The  shipwright  uses 
largely  of  iron,  and  that  he  may  do  so,  there  must  be  a  large  market  for 
su<rar,  tea,  coffee,  and  other  of  the  luxuries  and  comforts  of  life.  The 
larger  the  market,  the  larger  will  be  the  consumption  of  iron,  and  the  larger 
the  latter,  the  more  rapidly  will  the  former  grow.  In  a  wise  political 
economy  there  will  be  found  no  discords 

CHAPTER  EIGHTH. 
HOW   PROTECTION    AFFECTS   POPULATION. 

COMBINATION  of  action  is  indispensable  to  increase  in  the  value  of  labour. 
The  first  cultivator  can  neither  roll  nor  raise  a  log,  with  which  to  build 
himself  a  house.  He  makes  himself  a  hole  in  the  ground,  which  serves  in 
lieu  of  one.  He  cultivates  the  poor  soil  of  the  hills  to  obtain  a  little  corn, 
with  which  to  eke  out  the  supply  of  food  derived  from  snaring  the  game  in 
his  neighbourhood.  His  winter's  supply  is  deposited  in  another  hole,  liable 
to  injury  from  the  water  which  filters  through  the  light  soil  into  which  alone 
he  can  penetrate.  He  is  in  hourly  danger  of  starvation.  At  length,  how- 
ever, his  sons  grow  up.  They  combine  their  exertions  with  his,  and  now 
obtain  something  like  an  axe  and  a  spade.  They  can  sink  deeper  into  the 
soil ;  and  can  cut  logs,  and  build  something  like  a  house.  They  obtain 
more  corn  and  more  game,  and  they  can  preserve  it  better.  The  danger 
of  starvation  is  diminished.  Being  no  longer  forced  to  depend  for  fuel  upon 
the  decayed  wood  which  alone  their  father  could  use,  they  are  in  less  danger 
of  perishing;  from  cold  in  the  elevated  ground  which,  from  necessity,  they 
occupy.  With  the  growth  of  the  family  new  soils  are  cultivated,  each  in 
succession  yielding  a  larger  return  to  labour,  and  they  obtain  a  constantly 
increasing  supply  of  the  necessaries  of  life  from  a  surface  diminishing  in 
its  ratio  to  the  number  to  be  fed  ;  and  thus  with  every  increase  in  the  return 
to  their  labour  the  power  of  combining  their  exertions  is  increased. 

If  we  look  now  to  the  solitary  settler  of  the  West,  even  where  provided 
with  both  axe  and  spade,  we  shall  see  him  obtaining,  with  extreme  difficulty, 
the  commonest  log  hut.  A  neighbour  arrives,  and  their  combined  efforts 
produce  a  new  house  with  less  than  half  the  labour  required  for  the  first. 
That  neighbour  brings  a  horse,  and  he  makes  something  like  a  cart.  The 
product  of  their  labour  is  now  ten  times  greater  than  was  that  of  the  first 
man  working  by  himself.  More  neighbours  come,  and  new  houses  are 
wanted.  A  "bee"  is  made,  and  by  the  combined  effort  of  the  neighbour- 
hood the  third  house  is  completed  in  a  day ;  whereas  the  first  cost  months, 
and  the  second  weeks,  of  far  more  severe  exertion.  These  new  neighbours 
have  brought  ploughs  and  horses,  and  now  better  soils  are  cultivated  and 
the  product  of  labour  is  again  increased,  as  is  the  power  to  preserve  the 
surplus  for  winter's  use.  The  path  becomes  a  road.  Exchanges  begin. 
The  store  makes  its  appearance.  Labour  is  rewarded  by  larger  returns, 
because  aided  by  better  machinery  applied  to  better  soils.  The  town 
grows  up.  Each  successive  addition  to  the  population  brings  a  consumer 
and  a  producer.  The  shoemaker  wants  leather  and  corn  in  exchange  for 
his  shoes.  The  blacksmith  requires  fuel  and  food,  and  the  farmer  wantb 
shoes  for  his  horses ;  and  with  the  increasing  facility  of  exchange  more 
labour  is  applied  to  production,  and  the  reward  of  labour  rises,  producing 
now  wants,  and  requiring  more  and  larger  exchanges.  The  road  becomes 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  87 

a  turnpike,  and  the  wagon  and  horses  are  seen  upon  it.  The  town  becomes 
a  city,  and  better  soils  are  cultivated  for  the  supply  of  its  markets,  while 
the  railroad  facilitates  exchanges  with  towns  and  cities  more  distant.  The 
tendency  to  union  and  to  combination  of  exertion  thus  grows  with  the  growth 
of  wealth.  In  a  state  of  extreme  poverty  it  cannot  be  developed.  The 
insignificant  tribe  of  savages  that  starves  on  the  product  of  the  upper  soil 
of  hundreds  of  thousands  of  acres  of  land,  looks  with  jealous,  eyes  on  every 
intruder,  knowing  that  each  new  mouth  requiring  to  be  fed  tends  to  increase 
the  difficulty  of  obtaining  subsistence ;  whereas  the  farmer  rejoices  in  the 
arrival  of  the  blacksmith  and  the  shoemaker,  because  they  come  to  eat  on 
the  spot  the  corn  which  heretofore  he  has  carried  ten,  twenty,  or  thirty 
miles  to  market,  to  exchange  for  shoes  for  himself  and  his  horses.  With 
each  new  consumer  of  his  products  that  arrives  he  is  enabled  more  and  more 
to  concentrate  his  action  and  his  thoughts  upon  his  home,  while  each  new 
arrival  tends  to  increase  his  power  of  consuming  commodities  brought  from 
a  distance,  because  it  tends  to  diminish  his  necessity  for  seeking  at  a  dis- 
tance a  market  for  the  produce  of  his  farm.  Give  to  the  poor  tribe  spades, 
and  the  knowledge  how  to  use  them,  and  the  power  of  association  will  begin. 
The  supply  of  food  becoming  more  abundant,  they  hail  the  arrival  of  the 
stranger  who  brings  them  knives  and  clothing  to  be  exchanged  for  skins 
and  corn ;  wealth  grows,  and  the  habit  of  association — the  first  step  towards 
civilization — arises. 

Itis  not  good  for  man  to  live  alone,  and  yet  throughout  this  country,  we  find 
thousands  and  tens  of  thousands  of  men  flying  to  the  West,  there  to  commence 
the  work  of  cultivation  at  a  distance  from  their  fellow-men,  while  millions 
upon  millions  of  acres  of  rich  land  in  the  old  States  remain  untouched.  If,  now, 
we  refer  to  the  course  of  events  during  the  last  thirty  years,  we  see  that 
the  tendency  to  migration  increased  rapidly  between  1834  and  1842,  when 
the  building  of  mills  and  furnaces  ceased,  and  that  during  that  period 
we  colonized  Texas  and  Oregon.  In  the  years  which  followed,  the  tendency 
to  emigrate  diminished,  to  break  out  afresh  under  the  influence  of  the 
policy  of  1846.  The  last  twelve  months  have  witnessed  the  departure  of 
very  many  thousands  to  California,  Santa  Fe,  &c.,  while  the  emigration  to 
Iowa,  Wisconsin,  and  other  portions  of  the  extensive  West,  is  entirely  with- 
out precedent. 

"  It  is  estimated,"  says  the  editor  of  one  of  the  Iowa  papers, 

"That  between  fourteen  and  fifteen  hundred  wagons  have  crossed  the  Mississippi  at 
this  place,  within  the  last  five  weeks,  bringing  emigrants  from  Ohio,  Indiana  and  Illi- 
nois, and  all  of  them  seeking  homes  in  Iowa.  They  have,"  says  he,  "generally  gone  to 
the  new  counties  on  and  west  of  the  Des  Moines  river,  where,  we  know,  they  will  find 
lands  and  other  agricultural  advantages,  equal  to  any  in  the  world.  Allowing  five  per- 
sons to  a  wagon,  there  have  crossed  at  this  place  alone,  between  7000  and  8000  persons. 
We  are  told  that  the  same  extraordinary  influx  of  immigrants  has  taken  place  at  all  the 
other  crossings  along  the  river  Dubuque,  down  to  Keokuk.  It  is,  therefore,  reasonable  to 
suppose  that  from  30.000  to  50,000  persons  have  been  added  to  our  population  within 
the  last  month  and  a  half,  and  the  tide  is  still  pressing  towards  us.;'* 

If  we  desire  to  find  the  reason  for  the  extraordinary  tendency  now  prevail- 
ing to  seek  the  West,  it  may  be  found  in  the  diminishing  value  of  labour  in 
the  older  States.  The  production  of  iron,  coal,  cotton  and  woollen  cloths, 
and  of  commodities  generally,  has  diminished  ;  and  there  is  not  only  no  de- 
mand for  labour  in  the  construction  of  new  mills  and  furnaces,  or  in  the 
opening  of  new  coal  mines,  but  the  number  of  persons  employed  is  actually 
diminished.  The  natural  increase  of  our  population  is  almost  600,000,  and 
the  immigration  of  the  present  year  is  about  300,000 ;  and  thus  900,000 

•  Burlington  (Iowa)  Gazette. 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 


persons  are  added,  while  the  number  that  can  find  employment  in  the  old 
States  is  less  than  it  was  two  years  since.  All  these  people  must  eat,  and  if 
they  cannot  obtain  food  in  exchange  for  labour,  employed  in  the  mining  of 
coal  or  manufacture  of  cloth  or  iron,  they  must  raise  it  for  themselves,  and 
hence  it  is  that  the  population  of  the  new  States  grows  now  so  rapidly. 

Here  is  a  case  of  apparent  discord.  The  people  of  the  new  States 
need  neighbours  to  help  them  to  make  roads  and  build  churches  and 
school-houses,  and  the  state  of  things  that  injures  the  farmers  of  Pennsyl- 
vania, New  York  and  Virginia,  benefits  all  those  who  are  already  in  Wis- 
consin ajid  Iowa.  They  profit  by  free-trade  and  would  be  injured  by  pro- 
tection. Strange  as  it  may  seem,  however,  directly  the  reverse  is  the  case. 
The  harmony  of  interests  is  perfect,  and  the  discord  is  only  apparent.  The 
new  States  would  grow  faster  under  protection  than  they  now  do  under 
free-trade.  But  for  the  abolition  of  protection,  in  1832-3,  Iowa,  Wis- 
consin, &c.,  would  now  be  populous  States,  as  I  propose  now  to  show. 
From  1821  to  1825,  there  existed  no  inducement  for  emigration  from  Eu- 
rope to  this  country.  Wages  here  were  low,  and  the  difficulty  of  obtaining 
employment  was  great.  The  average  number  of  immigrants  was  but  7138,  and 
the  last  year  was  little  more  than  the  average.  By  1829,  it  reached  24,000. 
Five  years  after,  (1834,)  it  was  65,000.  The  average  of  the  next  nine  years 
was  but  72,000 ;  and,  in  the  last  of  those  years,  it  was  but  75,179.  Like  every 
thing  else,  immigration  was  stationary.  In  the  four  following  years  it  was 
trebled.  This  year  it  may  reach  230,000.  It  has  already  begun  to  decline. 

It  is  obvious  that  the  demand  for  labour  grows  with  increase  in  the  num- 
ber of  modes  in  which  it  can  be  applied  ;  and  that  with  every  step  in  that 
direction  the  return  to  labour  increases,  enabling  the  labourer  to  obtain  larger 
wages — that  is  to  say,  more  food,  fuel,  clothing,  books  and  newspapers,  and 
greater  facilities  for  the  education  of  his  children,  in  return  to  the  same 
labour.  We  see  that  the  power  to  obtain  these  good  things  increased  rapidly 
from  1830  to  1834,  and  that  the  effect  was  to  produce  a  vast  increase  of 
immigration.  With  every  such  increase  there  must,  necessarily,  have  been 
increased  power  of  combination,  accompanied  by  increased  facilities  for  ob- 
taining the  things  for  which  men  are  willing  to  labour ;  offering  new  attrac- 
tions for  the  labourer,  and  producing  a  further  increased  tendency  in  the  same 
direction.  In  a  former  chapter,  I  have  supposed  that  it  might  by  this  time  have 
reached  1,000,000  per  annum,  and  that  it  would  have  done  had  it  doubled  but 
once  in  four  years.  A  duplication  in  three  years  would  have  brought  it  by  this 
time  to  2,000,000.  Taking  it,  however,  at  the  former  quantity,  we  should 
have  imported  in  the  intermediate  period  nearly  6,000,000,  instead  of  less 
than  2,000,000.  If  we  now  add  thereto  the  natural  increase  of  all  these 
people,  we  would  have  at  this  moment  a  population  exceeding  by  at  least 
5,000,000  the  number  we  now  have;  and  of  these,  while  vast  numbers 
would  have  been  employed  in  giving  value  to  the  lands  of  the  older  States, 
by  opening  mines  and  building  furnaces,  millions  would  have  sought  the 
West,  the  access  to  which  would  have  been  rendered  daily  more  and  more 
easy  by  the  increased  facility  of  obtaining  iron  for  the  construction  of  steam- 
boats and  rail-roads. 

The  large  immigration  of  the  last  and  previous  years  is  by  many  ascribed 
to  the  troubles  in  Europe  ;  but  their  effect  has  been  small.  All  commodities 
lend  to  seek  the  best  market,  and  to  this  rule  labour  forms  no  exception. 
The  people  of  Europe  are  anxious  to  transfer  themselves  here  because  man 
is  here  a  commodity  of  more  value  than  in  Europe,  and  can  obtain  more 
food,  fuel  and  clothing,  and  better  shelter,  in  return  for  the  same  quantity  of 
labour,  than  he  can  at  home  ;  and  the  more  widely  extended  the  knowledge 
that  such  is  the  fact,  the  greater  is  the  anxiety  to  reach  our  shores.  Had 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  89 

the  demand  for  labour  continued  to  increase  as  it  did  from  1844  to  1847,  the 
immigration  of  the  present  year  would  probably  far  exceed  even  half-a-million; 
whereas,  there  is  every  reason  to  believe  that  there  will  be  a  great  diminu- 
tion. 

CHAPTER  NINTH. 

HOW  PROTECTION    AFFECTS  THE    MEANS    OF    TRANSPORTATION INTERNAL  AND 

EXTERNAL. 

THE  more  widely  men  are  separated,  the  greater  is  the  difficulty  attendant 
on  the  making  of  roads,  and  the  greater  is  the  quantity  of  labour  lost  to  the 
farmer  in  performing  the  work  of  transportation,  and  the  poorer  he  remains. 
The  more  men  are  enabled  to  combine  their  exertions,  the  greater  is  the 
facility  of  obtaining  roads ;  the  less  the  labour  lost  in  transportation,  the  more 
can  be  given  to  the  work  of  production,  and  the  richer  will  the  farmer  grow. 

During  the  years  from  1835  to  1840,  the  tendency  was  to  separation, 
and  there  was  great  need  of  roads.  The  widely  scattered  settlers  of  Illinois, 
Indiana,  Michigan  and  Mississippi  could  not  make  them  of  themselves,  and 
none  would  trust  them  individually  with  the  means  necessary  for  their  con- 
struction. To  remove  this  difficulty,  they  united  in  borrowing  the  food  and 
clothing  and  the  iron  required  for  the  purpose,  pledging  the  faith  of  the 
State  for  payment  of  the  cost,  and  the  result  was  universal  ruin.  Men  were 
scattering  themselves,  and  labour  was  becoming  less  productive;  the  con- 
sequence of  which  was,  that  immigration  ceased  to  increase  ;  and  it  was  pre- 
cisely when  the  growth  of  population  from  that  source  was  arrested,  that 
we  were  extending  the  area  of  settlement,  and  diminishing  the  power  pi 
combining  exertion  for  the  purpose  of  increasing  the  return  to  labour. 

We  are  now  doing  precisely  the  same  thing.  Men  are  scattering  them- 
selves widely,  and  there  is  a  great  demand  for  roads.  The  papers  from 
day  to  day  inform  us  of  the  new  ones  that  are  being  made  in  the  West  with  iron 
that  is  obtained  in  exchange  for  certificates  of  debt,  bearing  interest,  that 
must  be  paid.  The  men  who  should  be  making  iron  are  seeking  the  West, 
and  borrowing  the  iron  they  should  be  making,  and,  if  the  system  be  long 
continued,  the  result  must  be  the  same  that  was  witnessed  in  1843-3. 

It  is  to  this  unnatural  expansion  of  a  small  population  over  large  surfaces 
that  is  due  the  agitation  of  the  question  of  improvement  by  the  general 
government,  one  of  the  most  dangerous  now  remaining  to  be  settled.  If 
the  settlement  and  cultivation  of  new  lands,  and  the  formation  of  new  States, 
proceeded  naturally,  the  population  would  become  sufficiently  rich  to  be 
enabled  to  make  their  own  roads  and  improve  their  own  harbours  ;  but  as 
that  cannot  be  the  case  under  the  existing  system,  they  look  to  the  govern- 
ment for  aid.  At  this  moment,  it  is  proposed  that  a  vast  amount  of  land 
should  be  given,  or  sold  at  a  very  low  price,  to  aid  in  the  making  of  a  road 
to  California,  a  work  that,  if  prosecuted  with  vigour,  would  be  finished  half  a 
century  before  it  would  pay  interest  on  its  cost,  because  it  would  tend  only 
to  promote  the  further  dispersion  of  population,  and  the  further  diminution 
in  the  productiveness  of  labour.  We  need  concentration  to  render  labour 
more  productive,  and  to  promote  immigration ;  and  if  that  be  obtained,  the 
natural  and  profitable  settlement  of  the  country  beyond  the  Mississippi  will 
go  on  so  rapidly  as  to  insure  a  connection  with  the  Pacific,  with  advantage 
to  all,  in  a  very  reasonable  time.  It  is  doubtful  if  there  is  a  single  instance 
on  record  of  a  road  having  been  made  with  a  view  to  attract  population,  or 
one  that  has  been  altogether  dependent  on  through  travel  and  trade,  as  this 
must  for  a  long  time  be,  that  has  not  proved  a  failure.  To  make  roads  pro- 
ductive, they  must  pass  through  countries  where  men  consume  on  the  land 
a  good  portion  of  the  products  of  the  land,  atd  grow  rich,  and  not  through 


90  THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 


those  in  which,  because  of  the  absence  of  consuming  population,  every  thing 
that  is  raised  on  the  land  is  sent  from  the  land,  and  its  owners  remain  poor. 
tf  this  road  be  now  made,  there  will  be  great  Joss  somewhere,  and  fall 
where  it  may,  it  will  be  a  loss  to  the  community. 

The  reason  why  such  roads  are  unprofitable  is,  that  the  transportation 
upon  them  is  almost  entirely  limited  to  bulky  articles  that  must  be  carried 
at  low  freights.  The  most  valuable  of  all  commodities  is  man,  and  upon 
such  roads  the  travel  is  small,  for  the  people  are  poor,  and  must  remain  at 
home.  Their  products  pay  little  to  the  road,  yet  the  little  that  is  left  pur- 
chases but  little  of  silk,  or  cloth,  or  other  of  the  articles  of  merchandise 
upon  which  high  tolls  can  be  charged.  Where,  on  the  contrary,  there  is  a 
large  consuming  population  on  the  line,  the  way-travel  is  great,  and  the 
commodities  that  pass  to  market  pay  good  freights,  while  the  balance  pays 
for  much  merchandise  to  be  returned. 

Applying  these  views  to  the  means  of  intercourse  with  foreign  nations, 
we  may  now,  I  think,  see  why  it  is  that  shipping  grows  with  protection. 

The  merchandise  we  send  to  Europe  is  bulky,  and  the  returns  are  com- 
pact, a  consequence  of  which  is  that  the  outward  cargo  has  generally  had  to 
bear  almost  all  the  charges  of  the  voyage. 

From  1830  to  1834,  the  reward  of  labour  was,  however,  such  as  induced  a 
great  increase  of  immigration,  and  thus  was  secured  a  valuable  return  cargo, 
the  receipts  from  which  tended  largely  to  diminish  the  charges  on  outward 
freights,  and  thus  the  planter  and  farmer  were  enabled  to  consume  more 
largely  of  the  merchandise  of  Europe,  which  pays  high  freights,  and  more 
of  tea  and  coffee,  while  the  demand  for  the  raw  materials  used  in  manufac- 
tures, also  enabled  ships  to  bring  them  as  part  of  their  return  cargoes, 
facilitating  the  transmission  of  our  produce  and  merchandise  to  other  parts 
of  the  world. 

From  1835  to  1844,  immigration  was  almost  stationary.  So  was  ship- 
ping. From  1845  to  the  present  time  immigration  has  grown  rapidly.  So  has 
shipping.  We  now  import  300,000  persons,  and  the  usual  allowance  being 
two  persons  to  five  tons,  it  follows  that  shipping  to  the  extent  of  250,000 
tons,  making  three  trips  per  annum,  is  so  employed.  Freights  to  Europe 
are  low,  because  the  return  cargo  is  large  and  valuable.  Ships  of  the  first 
class  are  now  built  expressly  for  the  importation  of  men,  and  so  will  they 
continue  to  be,  if  the  number  of  passengers  shall  continue  to  increase. 
With  a  diminution  of  it,  the  building:  of  ships  will  diminish,  and  freights 
to  Europe  will  rise,  because  a  valuable  return  cargo  cannot  then  be  cal- 
culated upon.  The  rise  of  freights  will,  as  a  matter  of  course,  diminish 
the  number  of  articles  that  will  bear  exportation,  and  the  quantity  of  mer- 
chandise that  can  be  imported  from  Europe,  while  the  diminution  in  the 
number  of  mouths  requiring  tea,  coffee,  and  other  similar  commodities,  will 
tend  still  further  to  diminish  the  tendency  towards  the  building  of  ships. 

Were  we  now  importing  a  million  of  people,  the  shipping  required  for 
that  purpose  alone  would  be  830,000  tons,  and  freights  to  Europe  would  be 
almost  nominal,  for  great  numbers  would  go  altogether  in  ballast.  What- 
ever tends  to  increase  the  bulk  of  the  commodities  imported  tends  equally 
to  diminish  the  cost  of  transportation,  and  to  increase  the  export  of  the  pro- 
ducts of  the  farmer  and  planter.  If  we  imported  raw  silk,  we  should  import 
Frenchmen  to  manufacture  it,  and  coffee  for  them  to  drink,  and  the  ships 
that  imported  the  silk,  the  men,  and  the  coffee,  would  cheaply  transport 
cotton  or  cotton  cloth.  If  we  import  gutta  percha,  we  obtain  it  frcm  one  who 
desires  to  buy  cloth,  and  to  whom  cloth  can  then  be  cheaply  sent.  If  we 
import  gutta  percha  goods,  we  obtain  them  from  men  who  have  cloth  to  sell, 
and  to  whom  cotton  cannot  be  cheaply  sent.  If  we  desire,  then,  to  increase 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  91 

our  commerce  and  our  navigation,  the  object  is  to  be  accomplished  by  the 
adoption  of  measures  that  will  bring  the  loom  to  take  its  place  by  the  side 
of  the  plough.  The  harmony  of  the  agricultural,  manufacturing,  and  ship- 
ping interests  would  here  appear  to  be  complete. 

With  such  an  importation  of  men,  there  would  be  an  annual  addition  of 
1,000,000  with  whom  we  would  have  perfect  freedom  of  trade,  uninterfered 
with  by  custom-house  officers,  sailors,  or  ships.  At  the  end  of  ten  years, 
there  would  be  thus  made  an  addition  of  twelve  or  thirteen  millions  of 
persons,  who  would  consume  twice  as  much  cotton  as  is  now  consumed  by 
the  whole  people  of  Great  Britain  and  Ireland.  The  harmony  between  the 
views  of  the  free-traders  and  those  of  the  protectionists  would  thus  appear  to 
be  almost  perfect.  The  more  the  subject  is  examined,  the  more  obvious 
does  it  become  that  the  only  road  to  perfect  freedom  of  trade  lies  through 
perfect  protection. 

CHAPTER  TENTH. 
HOW    PROTECTION  AFFECTS  THE  FARMER. 

AMONG  the  large  exporters  of  food  are  Ireland,  Canada,  Russia,  and  the 
United  States. 

The  first  exports  both  food  and  population.  The  bulk  of  her  trade  is  alto- 
gether outward,  and  the  food  has  to  bear  all  the  cost  of  the  voyage  out  and 
home.  The  yield  to  the  producer  is  therefore  small,  and  tends  rapidly  to 
diminish,  the  consequences  of  which  are,  famine,  pestilence,  and  depopu- 
lation. 

The  second  exports  food  and  lumber,  and  imports  some  population  for 
home  consumption,  and  much  that  is  exported  to  the  United  States.  The 
excess  of  exports  is,  however,  sufficiently  great  to  throw  nearly  the  whole 
weight  of  the  voyage  out  and  home  upon  the  producer. 

Neither  of  these  countries  has  any  protection  against  the  colonial  system. 
The  food  they  export  comes  back  to  them  in  the  form  of  cloth  and  iron,  duty 
free,  and  almost  freight  free,  because  the  bulk  of  the  traffic  is  in  the  outward 
direction. 

Russia  exports  food,  but  she  protects  manufactures, and  thus  makes  a  market 
for  much  of  it  at  home.  Her  capacity  to  supply  grain  is  by  one  authority 
stated  to  be  equal  to  17,000,000,  and'  by  another  28,000,000  of  quarters. 
(153  and  252  millions  of  bushels  of  60  pounds  weight,)  and  we  are  told 
that— 

"  In  the  years  when  there  is  no  foreign  demand  for  this  surplus,  a  portion  of  it  is  em- 
ployed, with  little  regard  to  economy,  in  fattening  cattle  for  the  butchers,  and  for  the  sake 
of  the  tallow.  Much  is  absolutely  wasted,  and  the  remainder,  left  unthreshed,  becomes 
the  prey  of  birds  and  mice."  Also  that  "  if  a  foreign  market  could  be  found  for  it,  Russia 
could  easily  export  annually  50,00(.l,000  of  quarters  of  grain,  (equal  to  450,000,000  of 
bushels  of  sixty  pounds  weight.)"* 

The  system  of  that  country  is  adverse  to  the  growth  of  wealth  and  in- 
telligence. Large  armies  and  hosts  of  officials  are  maintained  out  of  her  heavy 
taxes,  paid  from  the  earnings  of  the  producing  classes,  while '  the  existence 
ef  serfdom,  and  the  necessity  for  giving  so  large  a  portion  of  the  lives  of  the 
healthiest  and  best-formed  of  the  population  to  the  business  of  carrying 
sabres  and  muskets,  tends  to  prevent  the  existence  of  any  hope  of  improve- 
ment; and  without  hope  there  can  be  little  disposition  for  exertion.  Never- 
theless, as  we  see,  the  Russian  has  food  to  waste,  while  Irishmen  perish  by 
tens  of  thousands  of  starvation. 

In  this  country  the  system  of  protection  exists.    It  is  now  limited  *o  ^.irty 

*  London  Economist. 


92  THE  HARMONY  OF  INTERESTS. 


per  cent. ;  and  for  the  last  twenty  years  it  has  but  once,  and  for  a  very  brief 
period,  been  at  a  lower  point.  By  its  aid  there  has  been  produced  a 
diversification  of  pursuits,  that  enables  men  to  economize  much  time  and 
many  things  that  would  otherwise  be  wasted,  while  women  and  children  find 
employment  at  such  wages  as  enable  them  to  be  large  consumers  of  both 
food  and  clothing.  Wages  are  high,  and  hence  it  is  that  there  is  so  large  an 
import  of  the  most  valuable  of  commodities — man. 

We  imported  last  year  about  300,000  persons.  Estimating  their  con- 
sumption of  food  at  twenty  cents  per  day  for  each,  there  was  thus  made  a 
market  on  the  land  for  the  products  of  the  land  to  the  extent  of  twenty  mil- 
lions of  dollars.  Their  transportation  required  the  constant  employment  of 
250,000  tons  of  shipping,  and  ships  carried  freight  to  Europe  at  very  low 
rates,  because  certain  of  obtaining  valuable  return  cargoes.  The  farmer 
thus  obtained  a  large  home  market,  and  the  power  of  exporting  cheaply  to 
the  foreign  one,  and  to  the  conjoined  operation  of  these  two  causes  is  due 
the  fact  that  wheat  and  flour  have  continued  so  high  in  price. 

We  may  now,  I  think,  understand  many  curious  facts  now  passing  before 
our  eyes.  Food  is  so  abundant  in  Russia  that  it  is  wasted,  and  yet  among 
the  large  exporters  of  food  to  Great  Britain  is  this  country,  in  which  it  sells 
at  a  price  almost  as  high  ae  in  Liverpool,  and  now  even  higher.  The 
produce  of  Russia  has  to  bear  all  the  charges  out  and  home,  and  the  con- 
sequence is,  that  the  producer  remains  poor  and  makes  no  roads,  and 
thus  the  cost  of  transportation,  internal  and  external,  continues,  and  must 
continue,  great.  The  farmer  of  the  United  States  sends  his  produce  to 
market  cheaply,  because  the  return  cargo,  being  chiefly  man,  is  valuable,  and 
the  space  it  occupies  is  great.  He  therefore  grows  rich,  and  makes  roads, 
and  canals,  and  builds  steamboats;  and  thus  is  the  cost  of  transportation, 
internal  and  external,  so  far  diminished  that  the  difference  in  the  price  of  a 
barrel  of  flour  in  Pittsburgh  and  in  Liverpool  is,  when  we  look  at  the  distance, 
almost  inconceivably  small. 

The  bulk  of  the  trade  of  Canada  is  outwards ;  and  the  consequence  is 
that  outward  freights  are  high,  while  our  imports  of  men  and  other  valuable 
commodities  keep  them  low  with  us,  and  therefore  it  is  that  the  cost  of  trans- 
porting wheat  and  flour  from  our  side  of  the  line  is  so  much  lower  than 
from  the  other,  that  both  now  pass  through  New  York  on  their  way  to  Liver- 
pool.* Hence  it  is  that  there  has  arisen  so  vehement  a  desire  for  commercial  re- 

•  From  one  of  the  journals  of  the  day  I  take  the  following  extract  from  a  Canadian 
letter: — 

"  Our  commercial  relations  with  your  Union  are  a  subject  of  great  anxiety  with  us  at  the 
present  time.  Wheat  is  worth  from  2s.  to  3s.,  York,  more  on  your  side  of  the  Lake  than 
on  this.  This  is  owing  to  two  causes :  the  20  per  cent,  duty  you  impose  upon  our  grain 
when  imported  and  sold  in  your  market,  and  the  want  of  a  sufficient  number  of  resident 
wheat  buyers  who  have  sufficient  capital  to  enable  them  to  take  advantage  of  your  bond- 
ing Act.  If  your  Cabinet  has  determined  to  annex  us,  they  will  refuse  us  reciprocity.  In 
1847,  we  exported  of  Canada  wheat,  3,349,686  bushels,  and  in  1848,  3,413,397.  We  shall 
export,  at  least,  twice  as  much  this  year;  for  every  acre  of  land  that  was  in  a  condition  to 
grow  wheat  was  sown  with  that  grain,  and  the  crop  throughout  the  whole  of  Western 
Canada,  except  perhaps  the  Middle  District,  is  unusually  heavy. 

"'  The  Examiner'  estimates,  and  I  think  with  tolerable  accuracy,  that  our  farmers  will 
this  year  lose  $  1,500,000,  from  a  want  of  having  free  access  for  their  produce  to  your 
markets  The  Convention  of  Delegates  from  each  of  these  Provinces,  now  sitting  at 
Halifax,  have  under  consideration  the  question  of  securing  a  more  easy  interchange  of 
commodities  between  the  Province's  and  the  States.  A  notion  has  got  abroad,  thnt  if 
Canada,  Nova  Scotia,  New  Brunswick,  Prince  Edward  Island  and  Newfoundland  were 
united,  they  would  then  have  a  better  chance  of  obtaining  free  trade  from  you  than  ID 
their  present  isolated  condition.  It  is  rumoured  that  the  Home  Government,  for  som* 


THE    HARMONY    OF   INTERESTS.  93 

ciprocity,  and  even  for  annexation.  The  protective  system  has  thus  not 
only  the  effect  of  bringing  consumers  to  take  their  places  by  the  side  of 
the  producer,  facilitating  the  consumption  on  the  land  of  the  products 
of  the  land,  and  facilitating  also  the  exportation  of  the  surplus  to  foreign 
markets,  by  diminishing  outward  freights,  but  the  further  one  of  producing 
among  our  neighbours  a  strong  desire  for  the  establishment  of  the  same  per- 
fect freedom  of  trade  that  now  exists  among  the  several  States,  by  becoming 
themselves  a  part  of  the  Union.  Protection,  therefore,  tends  to  the  increase 
of  commerce  and  the  establishment  of  free  trade,  while  the  British  system 
tends  everywhere  to  the  destruction  of  commerce  and  to  the  production  of  a 
necessity  for  restriction. 

We  see,  thus,  that  if  we  desire  to  secure  the  command  of  that  which  is 
falsely  called  "  the  great  grain  market  of  the  world,"  it  is  to  be  effected  by 
the  adoption  of  such  measures  as  will  secure  valuable  return  freights.  The 
most  costly  and  the  most  valuable  of  all  are  men.  The  least  so  are  pig-iron 
and  coal.  The  more  of  the  latter  we  import,  the  larger  will  be  our  surplus 
of  food,  the  higher  will  be  the  outward  freight,  internal  and  external,  the 
greater  will  be  the  waste,  and  the  poorer  will  be  the  farmer.  The  more  of  the 
former  we  import,  the  smaller  will  be  our  surplus  of  food,  the  lower  will  be 
the  outward  freights,  and  the  more  numerous  will  be  the  commodities  that 
can  go  to  Europe,  to  be  given  in  exchange  for  luxuries  that  now  we  cannot 
purchase. 

Were  we  now  importing  a  million  of  men  annually,  the  downward  freights 
on  our  canals  and  railroads  would  be  greatly  diminished,  while  the  outward 
freight  across  the  ocean  would  be  little  more  than  would  pay  the  cost 
attendant  upon  loading  and  unloading  it,  and  yet  we  should  be  building 
ships  and  steamboats,  and  making  railroads  at  a  rate  of  which  we  could  now 
form  no  conception. 

By  aid  of  these  men,  coal  and  iron  would  be  produced  by  millions  of  tons, 
and 'the  increased  facility  of  obtaining  food  and  iron  would  give  new  facilities 
for  building  cotton  and  woollen  mills,  and  type-foundries  and  printing-offices, 
and  all  the  men  employed  in  them  would  be  large  consumers  of  food,  and 
thus  would  the  farmer  gain  on  every  hand. 

The  labourer,  in  Ireland,  obtains  Qd.  or  Sd.  for  a  day's  labour  when  em- 
ployed, but  the  average  of  the  year  is  even  less  than  the  former  sum.  He  is 
our  great  customer  for  Indian  corn,  the  cost  of  which,  by  the  time  it  reaches 
him,  is  about  4s.  or  five  times  what  it  has  yielded  to  the  farmer,  delivered 
on  his  farm.  Eight  day's  labour  are  thus  required  for  the  purchase  of  a 
bushel.  Transfer  that  man  to  the  coal-fields  of  Ohio  or  Indiana,  and  he 
may  purchase  far  more  by  the  work  of  a  single  day.  He  at  once  becomes 
a  much  better  customer  for  food,  and  is  enabled  to  consume  largely  of  sugar 
and  coffee,  to  the  advantage  of  the  merchant — of  wool,  to  the  further  advan- 
tage of  the  cultivator  of  the  land — of  lumber,  to  the  advantage  of  the  man 
who  has  land  uncultivated  that  he  desires  to  clear— of  cotton,  and  indigo, 
to  the  benefit  of  the  planter — and  thus  it  is  that  every  interest  in  the  country 
profits  by  the  transfer  of  the  poor  cultivators  of  Ireland,  and  of  Germany,  to 
the  coal  fields  and  iron-ore  beds  of  the  Union. 

The  young  Englishman  who  aspires  to  be  an  operative  spinner,and  now  fills 

purpose  of  its  own,  has  recommended  this  federation,  and  of  course  the  Colonial  puppets 
who  move  at  the  dictation  of  Downing  street,  will  pretend  that  a  measure  which  has  been 
forced  upon  them,  originated  in  the  commercial  necessities  of  the  Provinces.  To  obtain 
the  free  trade  they  desire,  the  Nova-Scotians  showed  symptoms  of  a  willingness  to  admit 
your  fishing  vessels  a  little  nearer  than  within  three  miles  of  their  shores;  and  Canada 
would  probably  throw  open  her  coasting-trade  to  your  vessels,  if  England  will  permit  her 
after  the  new  Navigation  Law  comes  into  operation." 


94  THE    HARMONY    OF   INTERESTS. 

the  place  of  the  latter  in  his  absence,  receives  7s.  6d. — $1-80  per  week,* 
the  price  of  two  bushels  of  Indian  corn.  Place  him  in  Alabama,  and  he  will 
earn  the  present  price  of  twenty  bushels,  and  he  will  then  eat  more  and 
better  food,  and  consume  ten  pounds  of  cotton  where  now  he  consumes 
but  one. 

The  hand-loom  weavers,  of  whom  England  has  800,000,  without  work. for 
one-third  of  the  number,!  consume  little  food  or  cotton.  Transfer  them 
here,  and  they  will  become  large  consumers  of  both. 

The  agricultural  labourer  of  England  receives  8s.  or  9s.  a  week,  little 
over  the  price  of  a  bushel  and  a  half  of  wheat.  Transfer  him  here,  and 
his  services  as  a  miner,  or  labourer,  will  enable  him  to  earn  the  price  of  five 
or  six  bushels.  He  will  then  consume  more  and  better  food,  and  largely 
of  cotton. 

The  poor  Highlander,  driven  from  his  native  hills  to  make  room  for  sheep, 
starves  in  the  miserable  lodging-houses  of  Glasgow.^  Could  he  be  trans- 
ferred here,  he  would  become  a  large  consumer  of  food  and  clothing. 

Our  present  policy  is  directly  the  reverse  of  all  this.  We  are  exporting 
men  by  tens  of  thousands  to  California,  and  by  hundreds  of  thousands  to 
the  West,  thus  diminishing  the  power  of  combination  of  action,  and  increasing 
the  necessity  for  the  use  of  ships  and  wagons  to  carry  their  produce  to 
market.  Thus  far  the  immigration  has  been  maintained,  and  freights  to 
Europe  are  consequently  low,  but,  with  the  diminished  wages  of  the  labourer, 
immigration  must  fall  off,  and  then  freights  must  rise,  and  thus  the  same 
measures  that  diminish  the  home  consumption  must  increase  the  cost  of 
going  to  the  distant  market.  The  cost  of  the  voyage  out  and  home  must 
be  paid  by  somebody.  If  there  is  no  return  freight,  the  farmer  or  planter 
must  pay  the  whole.  If  there  is  a  large  and  valuable  return  ireight,  he 
need  pay  scarcely  any  portion  of  the  cost.  To  California,  we  mur  pay  all  the 
outward  freight,  for  there  is  no  cargo  to  be  returned.  Bulky  articles,  the 
produce  of  the  farm,  cannot,  therefore,  go  from  here,  avid  loe  consequence  is, 
that  every  emigrant  to  that  country  is  a  customer  Ico.  tc  ihe  farmer,  and  a 
customer  to  a  diminished  extent  to  the  planter. 

The  most  costly  and  most  valuable  of  commodities;,  as  I  have  already  said, 
is  Man.  The  more  valuable  the  commodities  that  can  be  imported  into 
any  country,  without  going  in  debt  for  them,  tne  richer  that  country  will 
grow  ;  and  this  is  equally  true  of  every  State,  county,  township,  town, 
&c.,  into  which  it  may  be  divided.  Of  this  no  one  can  doubt,  and  yet 
every  portion  of  the  Union  is  engaged  in  expoiting  to  the  West,  to  Texas, 
Oregon,  and  California,  this  most  valuable  of  all  commodities,  receiving 

•  London  Economist,  Vol.  VI.  p.  259. 

•j-  Edinburgh  Review,  October,  1849. 

j  A  recent  British  journal,  speaking  of  the  Queen's  visit  to  Scotland,  thus  describes  the 
effects  of  the  desolating  policy  that  has  been  pursued  in  the  Highlands  : — 

»  The  untiUed  hills  and  glens  tell  their  own  story  most  effectually.  The  sheep  farms  of 
twenty  miles  length  and  breadth  proclaim  the  dark  character  of  that  policy  which  is  fast 
making  of  the  Highlands  a  great  hunting-ground.  Her  Majesty  is  to  pass  through  a.land 
of  Ameers.  The  same  wretched  policy  as  that  which  has  desolated  Scinde,  originating  in 
the  same  miserable  cause — the  selfishness  and  pleasure-seeking  of  the  owners — has  laid 
waste  the  Highlands.  They  want  a  Sir  Charles  Napier — a  legislative  if  not  a  military 
Napier.  They  need  the  repeal  of  the  game  and  entail  laws,  and  with  those  laws  repealed,  in 
twenty  years  there  would  be  no  difficulty  in  finding  a  population  to  welcome  the  monarch  on  tht 
beautiful  but  now  desolate  shores  of  Loch  Long  and  Loch  Jlwe.  The  pines§  would  flourish 
again ;  and  newspaper  reporters  would  not  be  weighing  the  question  whether  there  be 
or  be  not  a  habitable  house  where  they  might  rest  within  ten  miles  of  Loch  \  >ggan."— 
North  British  Mail. 

$  The  standard  of  the  Campbells,  who  inhabited  this  region,  bore  a  pine. 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  95 

nothing  in  return.  We  import  now  hundreds  of  thousands,  yet  the  old  States 
retain  scarcely  any  of  them.  All  must  go  West,  for  the  working  of  mills  and 
furnaces  is  stopped,  and  the  building  of  mills  is  at  an  end  until  we  have  a 
change  of  policy.  Such  is  the  effect  of  the  colonial  system,  established  for 
the  purpose  of  preventing  combination  of  action  among  the  people  composing 
various  nations  of  the  world,  and  maintained  by  the  pursuit  of  measures 
destructive  alike  to  the  interests  of  the  people  of  England,  and  of  the  world 
at  large.  "Many  of  our  manufacturers,"  says  a  Manchester  broker,  "  have 
exported  to  a  loss,  and  if,  by  so  doing,  they  have  kept  foreign  competition  at 
bay,  and  checked  the  increase  of  industrial  establishments  abroad,  it  is  an 
unenviable  success;  still,"  he  adds,  "  as  this  country  is  doomed  to  be  a  manu- 
facturing state,  nothing  remains  but  to  beat  or  be  beaten."* 

These  losses  are  of  perpetual  recurrence.  They  are  a  natural  conse- 
quence of  the  "  war  upon  the  labour  and  capital  of  the  world,"  in  which 
England  must  "  beat  or  be  beaten."  They  must  be  paid  by  somebody,  and 
they  are  paid  by  the  labourers  of  England,  who  are  compelled  to  work  at 
diminished  wages ;  but  to  a  much  greater  extent  by  the  labourers  of  the 
world,  who  are  compelled  to  be  idle,  earning  nothing  to  pay  the  farmers  and 
planters  for  food  and  clothing,  when  they  would  gladly  be  employed,  earning 
wherewith  to  feed  and  clothe  themselves  and  their  children. 

How  small  is,  under  these  circumstances,  the  power  to  consume  food, 
will  be  obvious  to  those  who  see  that  three-fourths  of  the  people  of  England 
are  consumers  and  not  producers,  and  that  vet  their  import  of  grain  of  the 
last  two  years  of  free  trade  is  but  two  bushels  per  head.  How  insignificant 
is  the  quantity  she  takes  from  us,  and  trivial  the  amount  when  distributed 
among  the  people  of  the  Union,  may  be  seen  from  the  following  statement 
of  the  last  two  years  of  comparatively  large  export : — 

Flour.  Wheat.  Corn.          Corn-meal. 

Barrels.  Bushels.          Bushels.  Barrels. 

Year  ending  June  30,  1848,         958,744     1,531,000    5,062,000    226,000 
Aug.  31,  1849,     1,114,016    4,684,00012,721,000      88,000 

The  last  and  largest  amounts  in  round  numbers,  to  10,000,000  of  bushels 
of  wheat,  and  13,000,000  of  bushels  of  corn.  Deducting  the  transportation, 
the  product  of  this  on  the  farm  may  be  taken  at  not  exceeding,  and  pro- 
bably not  equalling  §10,000,000,  or  less  than  fifty  cents  per  head  for  the 
people  of  the  Union.  What  is  the  prospect  that  even  this  amount  will  con- 
tinue to  be  exported  may  be  judged  by  the  facts  that  nothing  but  the 
exceeding  lowness  of  freights  has  thus  far  maintained  the  export,  and  that 
calculations,  based  upon  the  low  price  of  food  in  Europe,  are  now  being 
made  upon  the  export  of  grain  to  this  country. 

"  The  accounts  that  have  reached  us  from  your  side  about  the  wheat  crop  have  led  to 
an  id-ea  here  that  it  is  not  improbable  the  United  States  may  become  an  importing  country 
for  grain,  as  on  some  previous  occasion  about  ten  or  twelve  years  ago.  We  regard  this 
as  highly  improbable  ourselves,  although  Sturges  allude  to  it  in  their  commercial  circular 
to-day.  It  is  said  Mark  Lane  governs  the  u-orld's  grain  prices:  and,  if  so,  the  European 
range  may  certainly  be  expected  to  be  very  low,  ibr  the  fall  here  is  fully  5s.  to  6*.  per 
quarter,  one-sixth  of  the  entire  value,  within  the  last  month.  Oats  are  down  to  16»  per 
quarter." — London  Correspondent  of  the  National  Intelligencer. 

The  shipments  of  both  wheat  and  flour  have  already  fallen  ofF  in  a  most 
extraordinary  degree,  since  freights  have  somewhat  advanced.     In  Septem 
ber,  flour  was  carried  to  Liverpool  for  6d.  a  barrel,  and  sometimes  even 
less.     The  lapse  of  two  months  has  brought  the  charge  up  to  ISd.,  and  the 


•  Circular  of  Du  Fay  &  Co.,  March  1,  1848. 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 


effect  is  shown  in  the  following  statement  of  the  export  from  the  principal 
ports  of  the  Union  from  the  first  of  September  to  the  latter  part  of  Novem- 
ber:— 

Flour.  Meal.  Wheat.  Corn. 

Barrels.         Barrels.  Bushels.          Bushels. 

1849        .        .        .        118,000        1,210        212,504        544,874 
Last  year,  same  period      491,000      27,754        849,350     3,447,820 

Decrease  .         .        .        373,000      26,544        636,846     2,902,946 

Notwithstanding  the  large  increase  of  agricultural  population,  the  quantity 
of  wheat  and  flour  received  at  tide-water,  on  the  Hudson,  shows  a  diminu- 
tion, while  the  only  increase  is  that  of  about  2,000,000  of  'bushels  of  corn, 
which  found  a  market  abroad  only  because  of  the  very  low  freights. 

The  import  of  men  has  made  a  market  for  $20,000,000  worth  of  food,  and 
these  people,  once  here,  remain  consumers  of  food,  and  customers  to  the 
farmer,  unless  compelled  to  become  producers  of  food  and  rivals  to  the 
farmer. 

The  "great  grain  market  of  the  world"  has  absorbed  half  as  much 
because  of  the  low  freights,  but  with  the  advance  of  freight  it  is  now 
diminishing,  and  must  still  further  diminish  with  the  continuance  of  that 
advance.  "Since  the  commencement  of  the  California  excitement,  near 
geve..  hundred  vessels,"  we  are  told,*  "have  left  for  the  Pacific,  many  of 
which  will  never  re-visit  us."  These  ships  will  not  be  replaced  unless 
freights  be  sufficiently  high  to  pay  their  owners.  If  immigration  go  on,  they 
will  be  soon  replaced,  and  the  cost  of  doing  it  will  be  paid  by  immigrants 
who  come  to  be  customers  to  the  farmer  and  planter.  If  it  do  not,  they  will 
not  be  replaced,  and  the  high  freights  of  the  remaining  ones  must  be  paid 
by  the  fanners  and  planters  seeking  customers  in  Europe. 

That  immigration  will  be  arrested,  must  be  obvious  to  all  who  study  the 
tables  given  in  the  third  chapter.  The  difficulty  of  obtaining  food,  fuel,  and 
clothing — i.  e.  wages— in  return  for  labour,  is  increasing.  The  value  of 
man  is  falling,  and  the  inducements  to  immigration  are  passing  away. 
Should  it  diminish  next  year  to  the  extent  of  100,000  persons,  there  will  be 
a  loss  of  market  to  the  extent  of  $7,000,000.  The  California  excitement 
which  carried  off  so  very  many  thousands  of  the  customers  of  the  farmer, 
with  food  to  feed  them  on  the  road,t  will  no  longer  exist.  Here  is  another 
hundred  thousand  customers  lost  to  the  farmer,  and  with  them  a  demand 
for  another  $7,000,000  worth  of  food.  The  European  market  is  being 
closed.  Nothing  that  diminishes  production  can  maintain  prices. 

A  comparison  of  the  amount  of  immigration  and  the  prices  of  wheat 
during  the  last  few  years,  will  show  how  essentially  the  interests  of  the 
farmer  are  connected  with  every  operation  tending  to  bring  the  consumer 
to  take  his  place  by  the  side  of  the  producer : — 

Years.  Immigration.         Price  of  Wheat  in  Philad.  Price  of  Flour  in  N.  Y. 

1840  .    84,000   .    .   $1-00    .    .   $5-25 

1841  .   83,000   .        94    ..    5-72 

1842  .   101,000   .    .    1-12    .    .    5-74 

1843  .   75,000   .    .     75    ..   4-47 

1844  .   74,000   .   .     89    .       4-70 

•  New  York  Herald. 

•f  "Your  receipts  of  beef  from  Missouri  will  be  very  moderate  this  winter,  inconse- 
quence of  the  great  demand  for  cattle  to  carry  emigrants  to  California."— .Corrtyondtnt 
*/  tht  Triburu. 


THE    HARMONY   OF    INTERESTS.  97 


Years. 

Immigration.         Price  of  Wheat  in  Philad.  Price  of  Flour  in  N.  Y. 

1845 

.       102,000      . 

86* 

.       .       4-52* 

1846 

.       147,000      . 

1-04 

.       .       5-23 

1847 

.       234,000      . 

1-33 

5-96  [potato  rot.] 

1848 

.       229,000       . 

1-19 

.  about   5-25 

1849 

.       299,000 

5-00 

If  we  convert  into  iron  delivered  back  upon  the  farm,  free  of  duty,  all 
the  food  tha;  has  been  this  year  exported,  we  shall  find  that  it  will  yield 
250,000  tons,  or  twenty-five  pounds  for  every  person  of  the  population.  Let  us 
now  go  to  the  vicinity  of  a  furnace,  and  see  how  light,  by  comparison,  is 
the  charge  for  iron  when  it  is  produced  on  the  spot,  and  paid  for  m  com- 
modities of  which  the  earth  yields  by  tons,  as  potatoes  or  hay— or  in  straw 
that  would  otherwise  be  wasted — or  in  labour  not  required  on  the  farm,  and 
then  estimate  how  many  tons  might  have  been  obtained  by  the  producers  of 
this  grain,  had  they  made  a  market  on  the  land  for  the  products  of  the  land. 

Let  us  now  suppose  that  instead  of  closing  old  furnaces  we  had  built  fifty 
new  ones,  each  capable  of  making  5000  tons,  with  rolling-mills  to  convert 
the  product  into  bars,  and  had  thus  applied  the  labour  of  some  of  those  im- 
migrants ;  and  that  we  were  now  making,  as  we  might  readily  be  doing 
250,000  tons  of  iron  more  than  was  made  last  year,  would  not  that  alone 
have  made  a  permanent  market  on  the  land  for  as  much  of  the  products  of 
the  farmer  as  we  have  exported  to  England  ?  Would  not  that  have  reduced 
the  cost  of  iron  ?  Would  it  not  have  raised  the  price  of  labour?  Would  it 
not  have  promoted  immigration?  Would  it  not  have  promoted  the  building 
of  ships  and  the  reduction  of  freights?  Would  not  the  farmer  thus  have 
had  the  control  of  the  market  of  England  to  a  much  greater  extent  than  he 
can  have  under  a  system  that  discourages  immigration  and  ship-building  ? 
Does  not  his  power  to  go  abroad  increase  with  the  diminution  of  the  necessity 
for  seeking  a  market  abroad  ?  If  we  Avere  importing  largely  of  raw  silk 
and  men  from  Italy,  could  we  not  send  cotton  yarn  to  Italy  more  cheaply 
than  it  now  goes  through  England  ? — and  if  we  were  importing  silk  weavers 
from  France,  could  we  not  send  to  France,  in  return,  food,  in  the  form 
of  coalf  and  iron,  at  less  cost  for  freight  than  that  at  which  they  now  have 
English  coal  and  iron  that  must  pay  all  the  cost  of  the  voyage  out  and 
home  ?  The  greater  the  value  of  the  import  trade — and  men  are  the  most 
valuable  commodities  we  can  import — the  greater  will  be  the  variety  of 
articles  we  can  export. 

It  is  contended  that  by  having  two  markets  to  which  he  must  resort,  the 
condition  of  the  farmer  is  improved,  and  that  if  he  had  but  the  home-market 
he  would  have  lower  prices  than  at  present — that  is  to  say,  that  if  he  could 
sell  all  he  produces  at  home,  he  would  obtain  less  than  he  now  obtains  by 
going  from  home.  Directly  the  reverse  is  the  fact,  when  men  are  compelled 
to  seek  a  distant  market. 

The  first  questions  to  be  asked  in  reference  to  this  are — Why  is  he 
obliged  to  go  from  home  ?  Why  does  the  supply  of  food  increase  faster 
than  the  demand  ?  For  this  there  are  two  reasons.  First :  we  do  not 
import  consumers  enough  ;  and,  Second :  of  those  whom  we  do  import, 
too  many  are  forced  to  become  producers  of  food,  in  consequence  of  the 
difficulty  attendant  upon  employing  themselves  in  other  pursuits  where 
they  would  be  consumers  of  food.  The  man  who  works  in  a  coal  mine 
earns  $300  a  year,  and  perhaps  more.  Much  of  this  goes  for  food, 

*  Some  of  these  variations  are,  of  course,  attributable  to  the  extent  of  the  crop.  The 
yield  of  wheat  in  the  West  in  this  year  was  larger  than  in  any  since  1839. 

f  Offers  have  been  made  to  transport  coai  to  France  at  little  more  than  the  ordinary 
freight  from  Philadelphia  to  Boston. 


THE    HARMONY  -OF    INTERESTS. 


and  all  of  it  goes  in  payment  for  things  that  are  the  product  of  the 
earth,  for  every  man  is  a  consumer  to  the  full  extent  of  his  production. 
Ten  thousand  miners  and  labourers  are  customers  for  those  products  to 
the  extent  of  $3,000,000.  Forty  thousand  mechanics,  miners,  and  labourers, 
are  customers  to  the  farmer  and  planter  to  the  extent  of  812,000,000, 
which  is  far  more  than  we  can  expect  to  export  in  future  years.  We 
now  import  annually  above  a  quarter  of  a  million  of  people,  and  there 
are  half  a  million  of  our  own  home-grown  population  annually  attaining 
maturity.  By  deducting  from  agriculture  20,000  working-men  we  diminish 
the  number  of  producers,  and  by  employing  these  20,000  in  other  pursuits 
we  increase  the  number  of  consumers  to  such  an  extent  as  to  prevent  the  ex- 
istence of  the  surplus  of  which  we  now  complain..  Judging,  however,  from 
the  past,  the  adoption  of  protection  as  a  permanent  system  would  result  in 
the  increase  of  immigration  to  a  vast  amount,  and  of  these  a  large  proportion 
would  gladly  remain  consumers  of  food,  whereas  under  the  present  system 
they  are  compelled  to  become  producers  of  food. 

When  farmers  have  a  demand  at  home  for  all  they  raise,  they  obtain  a 
higher  price  than  when  they  have  to  go  abroad.  In  the  one  case,  they  ob- 
tain nearly  as  much  more  than  the  price  in  distant  markets  as  the  cost  of 
transportation  from  those  markets,  whereas,  when  they  have  to  go  abroad, 
they  obtain  as  much  less  than  the  price  in  those  markets  as  the  cost  of  trans- 
portation to  those  markets,  and  the  price  of  the  whole  is  regulated  by  that 
which  can  be  obtained  for  the  trivial  surplus.  Grain  and  flour  have  for  several 
years  been  higher  in  the  coal  region  of  Pennsylvania  than  in  Philadelphia, 
because  the  demand  has  be«m  always  in  excess  of  the  supply.  Close  the 
mines,  and  the  farmers  will  have  to  send  their  products  to  Philadelphia,  re- 
ceiving therefor  the  city  prices,  minus  the  cost  of  transportation.  At  the 
present  time,  the  price  of  grain  throughout  the  Union  is  maintained  wholly 
by  the  domestic  market,  for  flour  sells  in  Liverpool  at  less  than  the  price  in 
New  York.  Close  the  mines  and  factories,  and  convert  miners  and  me- 
chanics into  farmers,  and  the  price  at  home  must  be  the  Liverpool  one, 
which  will  then  be  lower  than  at  present,  minus  the  cost  of  transportation, 
which  will  then  be  higher  than  at  present. 

Admitting,  however,  that  we  are  to  have  at  all  future  times,  a  surplus  of 
grain  for  export,  the  next  question  would  be — What  is  the  course  that  will 
secure  to  the  farmer  the  highest  price  in  foreign  markets  ?  The  answer 
must  assuredly  be,  that  it  will  be  that  which  tends  most  to  diminish  the 
quantity  to  be  sent  to  those  markets  from  this  or  other  countries.  If,  then, 
the  present  system  of  the  commerce  of  the  world  tends  to  increase  the 
supply,  it  must  be  adverse  to  the  interests  of  the  farmer.  That  such  is  the 
case  can,  I  think,  readily  be  shown. 

We  know  that  the  more  miners  and  mechanics  we  have,  the  more  food  we 
consume ;  and  that  the  more  agriculturists  we  have,  the  more  food  we  pro- 
duce. Such,  then,  must  be  the  case  with  other  countries.  We  know  that 
under  the  protective  system  miners  and  mechanics  increase  in  number,  and 
that  under  the  free-trade  system  the  producers  of  food  increase  in  number. 
Such,  then,  must  be  the  case  with  other  countries.  It  is  obviously,  then,  to 
our  interest  that  Russia  and  Germany  should  consume  more  food  and 
export  less,  and  that  if  they  and  we  should  do  so,  the  price  of  food  would 
rise.  Russia  and  Germany,  and  we  ourselves,  have  established  the  pro- 
tective system,  and  the  result  has  been  to  increase  the  consumers  and 
diminish  the  producers ;  and  if  all  the  world  could  follow  our  example,  the 
supply  of  food  now  pouring  into  "  the  great  grain  market  of  the  world" 
would  he  so  far  diminished  that  the  price  would  rise.  This,  however,  is 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  99 

but  one  of  the  effects  that  would  result  from  a  general  determination  to  put 
down  the  colonial  system. 

We  have  seen  that  the  consumption  of  cotton  in  other  countries  is  small, 
while  here  it  is  large.  The  price  has  already  fallen  so  low  that  the  planters 
are  resorting  to  the  cultivation  of  wheat,  a  measure  that  must  tend  to  the 
injury  of  the  farmer.  Now,  if  we  were  consuming  one  half  more  cotton 
than  at  present,  this  state  of  things  could  not  exist.  The  price  obtainable 
by  the  planter  would  then  be  sufficiently  high  to  prevent  the  necessity  of 
abandoning  its  culture.  Let  us  now  suppose  that  Canada,  and  Russia,  and 
Germany,  and  Ireland,  could  make  a  market  for  their  now  surplus  labour,  and 
thereby  enable  themselves  to  consume  two  or  three  pounds  of  cotton,  where 
now  they  consume  but  one,  and  to  consume  more  food  than  now  they  do — is 
it  not  obvious  that  the  prices  of  food  and  cotton  would  both  rise  ?  That  such 
would  be  the  result  of  the  abolition  of  the  colonial  system,  as  regards  these 
countries,  appears  perfectly  certain.  If  so,  then  the  maintenance  and  ex- 
tension of  the  protective  system,  with  special  reference  to  the  entire  abolition 
of  that  unnatural  one  which  Great  Britain  has  established,  appears  tome  to  be, 
most  certainly,  to  the  interest  of  the  farmers  as  well  as  of  the  planters  of  the 
Union,  and  of  the  world. 

Let  us  next  examine  the  working  of  the  system  in  Canada,  in  which  there 
being,  alroost  literally,  no  manufactures  of  any  kind,  there  is  no  market  on 
the  land  for  the  products  of  the  land. 

Freedom  of  trade  is,  there,  perfect :  that  is  to  say,  the  people  of  Great 
Britain  enjoy  a  complete  monopoly  of  the  machinery  by  aid  of  which  alone 
the  lumber  and  food  of  the  people  of  Canada  can  be  converted  into  cloth 
and  iron.  The  consequence  is,  that  the  labour-cost  of  manufactured  arti- 
cles is  so  great  that  the  consumption  of  them  is  small.  The  whole 
export  of  cotton  cloth  from  Great  Britain  to  her  North  American  pos- 
sessions, in  the  seven  years,  1840-46,  averaged  twenty  millions  of  yards, 
fine  and  coarse,  and  if  the  whole  were  there  consumed,  it  would  give  but  ten 
yards  per  head,  or  about  two  and  a  half  pounds  of  cotton  to  each  individual ; 
whereas  the  consumption  of  the  Union  averages  thirteen  pounds  per  head, 
and  i»  far  more  than  that  in  the  States  nearest  to  Canada.  If,  now,  we  desire 
to  know  why  it  is  that  consumption  is  less  on  the  one  side  of  the  line  than 
on  the  other,  the  reason  maybe  found  in  the  fact,  that  the  Canadian  gives 
much  more  labour  for  his  cloth  and  his  iron  than  the  American.  Even  his 
wheat  is  less  in  price;  and  if  so,  how  must  it  be  with  those  bulky  com- 
modities that  will  not  bear  transportation?  He  must,  in  the  words  of  Sir 
Francis  Head,  "  eat  all  he  raises,"  for  he  has  not  made,  nor  can  he  make  a 
market  on  the  land  for  the  products  of  the  land. 

To  the  Canadians  it  is  perfectly  obvious  that  the  price  of  food  with  us  is 
maintained  by  the  demand  for  home  consumption,  and  therefore  it  is  that 
there  exists  so  universal  a  desire  for  the  abolition  of  all  restriction  in  the 
importation  of  their  productions  into  the  Union.  They  have  perfect  freedom 
of  trade  with  "  the  great  grain  market  of  the  world,"  and  by  it  they  are  ruined. 
They  desire  intercourse  with  the  great  grain-producers  of  the  world,  and  to 
obtain  it  they  would  gladly  sacrifice  their  intercourse  with  England,  taking 
production  in  lieu  of  free  trade,  and  becoming  members  of  the  Union. 

Were  Canada  within  the  Union,  her  consumption  of  cotton  would  rise  to 
a  level  with  our  own,  for  she  would  at  once  commence  to  make  iron  and  cloth 
at  home,  producing  thereby  a  demand  for  labour  that  is  now  being  wasted.  In- 
stead of  being  a  customer  to  the  planter  to  the  extent  of  two  and  a  half  pounds 
per  head,  every  Canadian  would  take  a  dozen  pounds;  and  thus  would  fifteen 
millions  of  pounds  be  added  to  the  consumption,  to  the  infinite  ad  vantage  of  the 
planter.  The  fanner  of  Illinois  might  then  safely  admit  of  free  trade  with 


100  THE    HARMONY    OF   INTERESTS. 


his  Conr/.ifn  r^/jhbours,  because  with  increased  home  consumption  they 
would  experif  nee  less  necessity  for  going  abroad  to  find  that  market  for  their 
products  which  the  colonial  system  now  denies  to  them  at  home.  The  farmer 
who  believes  in  the  advantage  of  free  trade  with  England,  should  give  his 
vote  for  the  free  admission  of  Canadian  wheat,  raised  by  men  who  consume 
cloth  and  iron  made  by  men  who  eat  the  wheat  of  Poland  and  Russia.  The 
farmer  who  sees  that  the  price  of  wheat  is  maintained  by  the  home  demand, 
will  be  cautious  of  the  admission  of  foreign  wheat,  duty  free,  until,  by  means 
of  annexation,  the  farmer  of  Canada  shall  obtain  the  same  protection  that  he 
himself  enjoys,  and  thereby  be  enabled  to  make  a  market  on  the  land  for  the 
products  of  the  land. 

Having  thus  examined  the  effects  of  protection,  let  us  now  look  to  what 
would  be  the  effects  of  the  adoption  of  perfect  freedom  of  trade,  as  urged 
upon  the  world  by  England.  It  could  not  fail  to  be  that  of  rivetting  upon 
the  world  the  existing  monopoly  of  machinery  for  the  conversion  of  the 
products  of  the  farm  and  the  plantation  into  cloth  and  iron,  closing  the  fac- 
tories and  furnaces  of  Russia,  Germany,  and  the  United  States,  and  com- 
pelling the  people  who  work  in  them  to  seek  other  modes  of  employ- 
ment, and  the  only  resource  would  be  to  endeavour  to  raise  food.  There 
would  then  be  more  food  to  sell  ;  but  who  would  buy  it  ?  We  have 
already  seen  that  the  whole  exports  of  Great  Britain  amount,  after  paying 
for  the  grain  she  now  imports,  to  but  $4  32  per  head,  and  that,  small 
as  it  is,  it  tends  to  diminish.  With  that  she  has  to  pay  for  her  sugar, 
tea,  coffee,  cotton,  wool,  lumber,  and  all  other  foreign  articles  required 
for  her  own  consumption,  leaving  her  no  power  to  pay  for  more  grain. 
Nevertheless  it  would  be  poured  into  her  markets,  and  the  consequence  would 
be  that  she  would  obtain  three  bushels  where  now  she  has  but  one,  precisely 
as  we  have  seen  to  be  the  case  with  cotton.  "Mark  Lane  governs  the  world's 
grain  prices,"  and  as  the  price  obtainable  for  the  surplus  would  fix  that  of 
the  crop,  the  result  would  be,  that  the  farmers  would  everywhere  be  ruined, 
and  this  with  no  benefit  to  the  manufacturers  of  England,  for  her  farmers 
would  likewise  be  ruined,  and  her  agricultural  labourers  would  be  discharged, 
as  is  now  the  case  with  Ireland,  whose  population,  deprived  of  employment  at 
home,  swarms  to  England,  and  destroys  the  power  of  the  English  labourer 
to  obtain  food,  even  at  its  present  low  prices — and  the  lower  they  fall,  the 
less  must  be  the  demand  for  labour,  and  the  less  the  power  to  obtain  wages. 

The  proverb  says,  "  put  not  too  many  eggs  in  one  basket."  The  object 
of  the  British  system  is,  and  has  always  been,  that  of  compelling  the  world 
to  put  all  the  eggs  in  the  same  basket;  and  the  natural  result  is  the  occur- 
rence of  perpetual  convulsions,  producing  devastation  and  ruin  throughout 
the  world,  whenever  her  artificial  system  becomes  deranged.  A  review  of 
her  operations,  during  the  past  thirty  years,  shows  her,  at  every  interval  of 
four  or  six  years,  holding  out  to  the  world  the  strongest  inducements  to  send 
her  all  they  could  spare  of  sugar,  and  coffee,  and  cotton,  and  agricultural 
produce  of  every  description.  About  the  close  of  the  second  year  of  this 
movement,  when  the  machinery  of  importation  had  got  into  full  operation, 
a  change  is  seen  to  have  "  come  over  the  face  of  the  dream,"  and  the  whole 
energies  of  the  country  to  have  been  directed  to  breaking  down  prices,  with  a 
view  to  compel  exportation.  The  farmers  and  planters  whom  she  so  recently 
courted  are  now  ruined.  Their  agents  are  selected  as  the  first  victims,  and 
if  the  result  be  bankruptcy,  public  or  private,  it  is  followed  by  vituperation 
of  the  foulest  kind ;  and  thus  is  insult  added  to  injury.  The  people  of 
Pennsylvania  and  Maryland,  Indiana  and  Illinois,  Michigan  and  Mississippi, 
have  had  to  endure  all  this,  the  result  of  the  working  of  the  Compromise  tariff 
of  1833.  In  1846,  the  whole  world  was  urged  to  send  food  at  any  price. 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTEREyTS  101 

In  1847,  the  whole  object  was  to  depress  prices.  Rice  was  sold  for  the  mere 
freight  and  charges.  Large  shipments  of  corn  brought  the  shippers  in  debt 
for  the  payment  of  those  expenses.  The  fever  and  the  chill  having  passed 
away,  there  is  next  seen  to  succeed  a  period  of  languor:  then  one  of  moderate 
activity,  such  as  is  now  beginning  to  make  its  appearance.  Next,  specula- 
tion, excitement,  and  large  imports,  to  be  followed  by  the  ruin  of  all  around, 
in  the  effort  to  save  herself.  At  the  present  moment,  she  takes  certificates 
of  debt  in  payment  for  iron,  as  was  the  case  ten  years  since ;  but  the  day  is 
not  far  distant  when  these  certificates  will  have  to  be  redeemed  with  gold. 

Were  it  proposed  to  the  people  of  the  Union  to  make  New  York  or  Penn- 
sylvania the  deposit  for  alt  the  products  of  the  Union  that  required  to  be 
converted  or  exchanged,  the  absurdity  of  the  idea  would  be  obvious  to  every 
one.  The  wheat-grower  of  Michigan  would  find  himself  entirely  at  a  loss  to 
know  why  he  should  exchange  with  the  neighbouring  wool-grower  byway 
of  New  York;  and  the  cotton-grower  of  South  Carolina  would  be  equally  at 
a  loss  to  see  the  benefit  of  a  system  that  should  compel  him  to  exchange  with 
the  wheat-grower  of  Virginia,  through  the  medium  of  Philadelphia  or  Pitts- 
burgh ;  yet  such  is  precisely  the  object  of  the  colonial  system.  The  wheat 
of  Michigan  travels  to  Liverpool  with  the  wool  of  Michigan,  and  the  exchanges 
between  the  wheat-grower  and  the  wool-grower  are  effected  through  the 
market  of  Leeds,  three-fourths  of  the  wool  and  the  wheat  being  lost  on  the 
road.  The  rice  of  South  Carolina  goes  to  Manchester  in  company  with  the 
cotton  of  South  Carolina ;  and  the  corn  and  the  cotton  of  Tennessee  cross 
the  ocean  together;  and  this  long  journey  is  performed  under  the  idea  that  the 
planter  can  obtain  more  cloth,  for  his  rice,  or  the  farmer  more  iron  for  his  corn, 
by  this  circuitous  mode  of  exchange  than  he  would  do  if  the  exchanges  were 
made  on  the  spot.  There  are  many  who  doubt  the  truth  of  this,  yet  all 
English  politico-economical  writers  assure  us  that  such  is  the  fact ;  and  every 
measure  now  adopted  by  the  British  Government  is  directed  towards  the 
maintenance  of  the  monopoly  of  machinery,  by  aid  of  which  the  people  of 
the  world  have  been  compelled  to  make  their  exchanges  in  her  factories. 

If  such  a  course  would,  under  any  circumstances,  be  absurd,  how  much 
more  absurd  is  it  in  a  case  like  the  one  under  consideration,  where  the  power 
of  purchase  is  so  small,  and  so  little  capable  of  increase.  Whatever  goes  to 
England  must  be  there  consumed,  unless  it  can  be  forced  off  by  means  of 
low  prices;  and  for  what  she  consumes,  be  it  much  or  little,  she  has  $4'32 
per  head  of  her  population  to  distribute,  in  the  form  of  cloth  and  iron,  among 
the  fanners  and  planters  of  the  world.  It  is  a  Procrustean  bed,  and  the  mis- 
fortune of  the  poor  farmers  and  planters  is,  that  whatever  she  cuts  off  from 
the  portion  sent  to  her  is,  as  a  consequence  of  the  system,  cut  off  from  all  the 
crop. 

The  producers  of  the  world  have  been,  and  they  are  now  being,  sacrificed 
to  the  exchangers  of  the  world  ;  and  therefore  it  is  that  agriculture  makes  so 
little  progress,  and  that  the  cultivators  of  the  earth,  producers  of  all  we  con- 
sume, are  so  universally  poor,  and  so  generally  uninstructed  as  to  their  true 
interests.  The  day,  however,  cannot  be  far  distant  when  our  farmers  and 
planters,  at  least,  will  be  satisfied  that  their  interests  cannot  be  promoted 
by  a  system  that  separates  the  consumers  from  the  producers,  and  renders 
cloth  and  iron  so  costly  as  to  cause  the  average  amount  of  the  consumption 
of  either  to  be  utterly  insignificant. 

The  object  of  protection  is  that  of  diminishing  the  distance  and  the  waste 
between  the  producer  and  the  consumer;  thereby  enabling  the  producer  to 
grow  rich,  and  to  become  a  large  consumer  of  cloth  and  iron.  That  it  did 
produce  that  effect  is  obvious  from  the  immense  increase  in  the  consumption 
of  both  in  the  period  between  1843  and  1847.  That  the  facility  of  obtaining 


102  THE    HARMONS    OF    INTERESTS. 

iron  enabled  the  farmer  to  improve  his  mode  of  production  and  obtain  large 
returns  is  obvious  from  the  fact  that  the  supply  of  food  increased  so  rapidly. 
That  the  free-trade  system  produces  the  reverse  effect,  is  obvious  from  the 
great  reduction  in  the  consumption  of  iron  in  the  years  1842  and  1843,  and 
from  the  reduction  now  going  on;  the  whole  consumption  of  this  year 
not  equalling  that  of  1847,  notwithstanding  the  vast  increase  of  population. 

The  producers  of  food  throughout  the  world  have  one  common  interest, 
and  that  is  to  be  promoted  by  the  abolition  of  the  existing  monopoly  system, 
which  tends  to  destroy  themselves  and  their  customers. 

The  farmer  is  also  a  producer  of  wool,  and  therefore  I  will  briefly  allude 
to  that  interest. 

If  we  desire  evidence  of  the  truth  of  what  has  been  said  in  relation  to  food, 
it  may  be  found  in  the  condition  of  the  wool  market  for  several  years  past. 
Our  production  is  less  than  our  ordinary  consumption,  and  the  consequence 
is,  that  the  price  is  higher  than  in  any  country  of  the  world,  by  the  whole 
amount  of  the  cost  of  transportation.*  Close  the  woollen  mills,  and  the  price 
must  fall  to  the  level  of  the  markets  of  Europe,  minus  the  cost  of  exporta- 
tion. The  increased  supply  then  would,  as  a  matter  of  course,  produce  a 
fall  of  prices,  and  then  the  sheep  grower  would  be  ruined. 

The  changes  of  policy  of  the  last  twenty  years  have  several  times  ruined 
the  woollen  manufacturers,  and  the  sheep  growers  have  as  often  extermi- 
nated their  flocks ;  the  consequence  of  which  is,  that  we  have  less  than 
30,000,000,  when,  if  the  policy  adopted  in  1828  had  been  maintained,  we 
should  now  1  nve  100,000,000,  and  a  market  for  their  whole  products  at 
higher  price-  an  now ;  for  the  prosperous  labourers,  miners  and  mechanics, 
cotton-growe i  nd  food-growers,  would  then  consume  six  pounds  where 
now  they  consume  but  three,  and  the  number  of  our  population  would  be 
greater  by  7,000,000  than  at  present.  The  discord  that  now  exists  is  the 
result  of  the  "war  upon  the  labour  and  capital  of  the  world"  maintained  by 
England,  and  when  peace  shall  have  been  restored  by  the  abolition  of  the 
monopoly,  it  will  be  found  that,  between  the  interests  of  the  sheep-grower,  the 
producer  of  food,  the  miner  and  the  mechanic,  there  is  perfect  harmony. 


CHAPTER  ELEVENTH. 
HOW  PROTECTION  AFFECTS  THE  PLANTER. 

HAVING  thus  shown  how  the  English,  or  colonial,  system  operates  upon 
the  farmers  of  England  and  of  the  world  at  large,  I  propose  now  to  examine 
how  it  operates  upon  the  planters. 

Of  all  the  products  of  the  earth,  cotton  is  that  which  is  best  fitted  for 
clothing  purposes,  and  that  which  would  be  most  universally  used 
were  it  accessible  to  those  who  desired  to  use  it,  which  it  is  not.  There 
are  few  commodities  that  can  be  more  easily  raised,  none  that  can  be  con- 
verted into  clothing  at  less  cost  of  labour,  and  yet,  so  defective  are  the 
arrangements  for  its  distribution,  that  by  the  time  it  reaches  the  consumer 
it  has  become  so  costly  that  its  consumption  is  almost  nothing. 

The  whole  quantity  of  cotton  raised  is  probably  1,500,000,000  pounds 
tang  about  one  and  a  half  pounds  for  each  person  composing  the  popula 
lion  of  the  world  ;  yet,  notwithstanding  the  exceeding  smallness  of  this  quan- 
tity, the  power  of  consumption  throughout  the  world  is  ro  small  that  the 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  103 

producers  are  contending  with  each  other  for  the  possession  of  the  markets : 
and  the  competition  is  so  great  that  whenever  the  crop  of  this  country  reaches 
1000,000,000  pounds,  it  is  sold  at  a  price  less  than  the  actual  cost  of  pro- 
duction. Some  of  the  countries  that  formerly  exported  it  to  a  considerable 
extent,  now  raise  little  more  than  is  needed  for  their  own  small  consumption  ; 
and  even  here  the  question  of  limiting  the  quantity,  as  the  only  way  to 
avoid  ruin,  has  been  the  subject  of  anxious  discussion.  Throughout  the 
South,  planters  are  turning  their  attention  to  food,  although  the  market 
for  every  description  of  food  is,  and  must  continue  to  be,  glutted,  unless 
we  have  a  change  of  policy. 

There  is  a  perpetual  complaint  of  over-production,  and  it  is  matter  of 
rejoicing  when,  by  reason  of  short  seasons,  or  any  other  occurrence,  the  crop 
is  diminished  200,000  or  300,000  bales,  the  balance  producing  more  in  the 
market  of  the  world  than  could  otherwise  have  been  obtained  for  the  whole. 
No  better  evidence  need  be  desired  that  there  exists  some  error  in  the  dis- 
tribution. 

Over-production  cannot  exist,  but  under-consumption  may  and  does  exist 
The  more  that  is  produced,  the  more  there  is  to  be  consumed;  and  as  every 
man  is  a  consumer  in  the  exact  ratio  of  his  production,  the  more  he  can 
produce  the  better  it  will  be  for  himself  and  his  neighbour,  unless  there 
exist  some  disturbing  cause,  preventing  the  various  persons  desiring  to  con- 
sume from  producing  what  is  needed  to  enable  them  to  effect  their  exchanges 
with  the  planter,  to  the  extent  that  is  necessary  to  their  comfort. 

In  examining  into  the  movements  of  the  cotton  trade  of  the  world,  I  may 
sometimes  have  occasion  to  refer  to  facts  already  given ;  and  if  I  prefer  to 
re-state  them,  it  is  because,  from  the  great  importance  of  a  proper  understand- 
ing of  the  subject,  I  deem  it  best  to  collect  all  the  facts  necessary  to  that 
end  under  one  head. 

The  t\vo  great  cotton-producers  of  the  world  are  India  and  the  United 
States.  The  former  has  long  exported  to  distant  markets  food  and  cotton, 
indigo  and  saltpetre,  bulky  articles,  the  freight  and  charges  upon  which  absorb 
nearly  the  whole  product,  and,  as  a  necessary  consequence,  the  condition  of 
the  people  has  steadily  deteriorated.  The  difficulty  of  obtaining  food  has 
steadily  increased  as  her  manufactures  have  declined,  and  repeated  famines 
and  pestilences  have  swept  off  millions,  thus  diminishing  the  power  of  com- 
bination ;  and  she  now  therefore  exports  men  to  occupy  the  places  recently  oc- 
cupied by  the  slaves  of  Jamaica,  Guiana,  Demarara,  and  other  of  the  West 
India  colonies.  With  each  such  step,  the  cotton  culture  recedes  from  the  low 
and  rich  lands  towards  the  higher  and  poorer  ones,  and  the  condition  of  the 
cultivator  deteriorates,  for  with  each  a  larger  proportion  of  his  product  is 
swallowed  up  in  the  cost  of  transportation. 

In  the  early  part  of  the  present  century,  the  manufacturers  of  India  sup- 
plied cotton  goods  to  a  large  portion  of  the  world.  England  had  then,  how- 
ever, invented  machinery  for  its  production,  and  to  secure  herself  in  its  ex- 
clusive use  she  had  prohibited  its  export,  as  well  as  that  of  artisans,  and  thus 
she  compelled  the  cotton  to  come  to  the  loom,  instead  of  permitting  the  loom 
to  go  to  the  cotton.  By  degrees  she  cut  off  the  foreign  market  of  the  manu- 
facturer, but  his  home  market  still  remained  to  him,  so  long  as  the  Company 
retained  the  exclusive  control  of  the  trade.  In  1821,  the  last  year  of  the 
monopoly,  the  export  from  England  to  India  was  but  5,000,000  of  yards, 
and  4,000,000  of  pounds  of  yarn.  In  1832,  it  had  reached  60,000,000.  In 
the  first  half  of  last  year  it  was  110,000,000  of  yards,  and  10,000,000 
of  pounds  of  yarn.  Large  as  are  these  figures,  they  require  but  little  more 
than  100,000  bales  for  their  production,  and  would  make  a  consumption  of 
perhaps  220,000  bales  per  annum,  to  take  the  place  of  fh-i  wh'cn  ha* 


104  THE    HARMONY    OF   INTERESTS. 

ceased  to  be  raised.  With  every  step  in  the  increase  of  importation, 
production  has  diminished.  The  culture  and  the  manufacture  both  have 
disappeared  from  the  rich  lands  of  Bengal.  The  fields  formerly  occupied 
by  this  most  useful  plant  have  relapsed  into  jungle,  and  if  we  now  desire  to 
find  the  poor  cotton  planter  we  must  seek  him  among  the  hills,  where  he 
obtains  small  crops  in  return  for  much  labour,  and  then  spends  months 
in  the  nork  of  transportation  to  the  Ganges,  where  his  miserable  product  is 
shipped  to  Calcutta  on  its  way  to  England,  to  return  to  him  at  the  close 
perhaps  of  the  second  year,  giving  him  a  few  yards  of  poor  cloth,  a  com- 
bination of  cotton  and  flour,  in  return  for  the  cultivation  of  an  acre  of  land.* 
Under  this  system  the  value  of  labour  diminishes  steadily  and  regularly, 
and  with  it  the  quantity  and  quality  of  the  cotton  produced,!  yet  Englishmen 
are  accustomed  to  regard  the  low  price  of  labour  as  one  of  the  elements  of 
cheap  production,  and  to  look  to  it  as  affording  good  reason  to  hope  for  large 
supplies  in  future.  Thus  Mr.  Porter  informs  us  that :  — 

« In  the  level  plains  of  Candeish,  and  in  many  other  parts  of  Hindostan,  cotton  wool, 
freed  from  the  seed,  could  be  sold  with  a  profit  to  the  cultivators,  at  one  penny  per 
pound,  a  cost  which  is  trebled  or  quadrupled  by  the  expense  of  conveyance  to  the  ports 
of  shipment" — Porter's  Progress  of  the  Nation. 

The  price  which  remains  to  the  cultivator  is  one  penny  per  pound,  but 
where  "the  profit"  is  to  be  found  when  the  whole  wages  consist 'in  an  in- 
sufficient supply  of  the  poorest  food  and  clothing,  followed  by  famine  and 
pestilence  in  every  case  of  failure  of  crops,  it  is  difficult  to  imagine.  Such, 
however,  is  the  usual  mode  of  treating  this  subject  in  England.!  The  more 

*  The  produce  of  the  great  cotton-growing  districts  on  the  Nerbudda  is  carried  on  oxen, 
each  taking  one  hundred  and  sixty  pounds,  at  the  extreme  rate,  in  fair  weather,  of  seven 
miles  a  day.  The  distance  to  Mirzapore,  on  the  Ganges,  is  five  hundred  miles,  and  the 
cost  is  two  and  a  halfpence,  or  five  cents,  per  pound.  Thence  it  goes  to  Calcutta,  a  dis- 
tance of  eight  hundred  miles,  by  water,  unaided,  I  believe,  by  steam.  From  another 
portion  of  the  cotton-growing  districts,  in  the  Deccan,  the  transport  occupies  a  continuous 
journey  of  two  months,  and  in  the  rainy  season  the  road  is  impassable  and  the  traffic  of 
the  country  is  at  a  stand.  In  the  absence  of  even  a  defined  road,  the  carriers,  with  their  pack 
cattle,  are  compelled  to  travel  by  daylight  to  prevent  the  loss  of  their  bullocks  in  die 
jungles  through  which  they  have  to  pass,  and  this  under  a  burning  sun  of  from  one  hun- 
dred to  one  hundred  and  forty  degrees.  If  the  horde,  sometimes  amounting  to  a  thousand, 
is  overtaken  by  rain,  the  cotton,  saturated  with  moisture,  becomes  heavy,  and  the  black 
clayey  soil,  through  which  lies  the  whole  line  of  road,  sinks  under  the  feet  of  a  man  above  the 
ankle,  and  under  that  of  a  laden-ox  to  the  knees:  and  in  this  predicament  the  cargo  lies, 
sometimes  for  weeks  on  the  ground,  and  the  merchant  is  ruined !  "  Black  clayey  soils,'' 
rich  and  fertile,  are  here  superabundant,  but  the  poor  wretch  who  raises  the  cotton  must 
cultivate  the  high  lands  that  require  neither  clearing  nor  drainage,  and  his  masters  take 
half  the  product  of  their  poor  soils  while  refusing  even  to  make  a  road  through  the  rich 
ones :  yet  forcing  him  to  send  his  cotton  to  market  to  be  exchanged  for  cotton  cloth 
manufactured  thousands  of  miles  distant.  A  system  better  calculated  to  compel  men  to 
continue  cultivating  the  poorest  soils,  by  aid  of  sticks,  could  not  be  devised. 
•(•  Import  of  cotton  from  India  into  England  : — 

1844 88.000,000  Ibs. 

1845 58,000,000   « 

1846 34,000,000   '< 

Total  export  of  all  India  to  all  parts  of  the  world  : — 

1835-36 1,305,000  cwts 

1836-37          1,557,000    « 

1844-45         " 1,623,000     « 

1845-46  ...         .         .  -      .         1,328,000     « 

1846,  8  months        .  600,000    « 

$  A  series  of  popular  lectures  on  the  cotton  manufacture  has  recently  been  delivered 
in  London,  by  Mr.  Warren,  of  Manchester.     In  his  first  lecture  he  stated  that  should  the 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  105 

unproductive  labour  can  be  made  the  lower  will  be  its  price,  the  more  con- 
fident will  be  the  hope  of  using  it  to  advantage,  and  the  larger  will  be  the  sums 
expended  in  an  effort  that  must  prove  for  ever  vain,  while  the  people  shall  con- 
tinue to  be  prevented  from  consuming  on  the  land  the  products  of  the  land.* 

The  deterioration  of  quality  is  due. to  the  recession  of  cultivation  from  the 
lower  and  richer  lands;  and  that  recession  is  a  consequence  of  the  system 
that  has  ruined  the  manufacturers  of  India,  and  destroyed  the  power  of 
combination  of  action.  We  know  the  superiority  of  the  sea-island  cotton. 
In  Demarara,  cotton  plantations  have  always  succeeded  better  on  the  sea- 
coast  than  in  the  interior.  So  was  it  in  India.  Salt  manure  is  deemed  to 
be  of  absolute  necessity  if  superior  quality  be  desired,  as  it  gives  a  staple  at 
once  strong  and  silky.  Such  being  the  case,  it  is  useless  to  attempt  im- 
provement, when  day  by  day  the  cultivation  recedes  from  the  neighbour- 
hood of  the  sea,  producing  in  England  a  strong  desire  for  the  making  of 
railroads  by  which  it  may  be  enabled  to  make  its  way  from  the  hills  without 
costing  more  labour  for  its  transportation  than  had  been  required  for  its  pro- 
duction. Every  such  effort  must  prove  a  failure.  Free  trade  with  England 
drove  it  to  the  hills.  Freer  trade  will  drive  it  to  hills  yet  more  distant. 
In  some  cases  it  is  thought  that  if  the  poor  people  could  be  provided  with 
carts,  they  could  extend  the  culture  with  advantage,  but  the  use  of  such 
vehicles  supposes  the  previous  possession  of  something  like  Jaid-out  roads, 
and  those  are  luxuries  with  which  most  of  India  is  yet  unprovided. 

Like  the  people  of  India,  those  of  the  Southern  States  of  the  Union  have, 
thus  far,  had  a  bulky  outward  trade,  that  had,  of  course,  to  bear  all  the  ex- 
penses of  the  voyage  out  and  home.  For  a  time,  this  prospered.  India  was 
distant  from  the  machinery  of  conversion  and  Carolina  was  near,  and  while 
it  still  continued  necessary  to  resort  to  the  former  for  supplies,  the  price  of 
that  raised  in  the  latter  was  the  price  in  India,  plus  the  difference  of 
transportation.  England  was  a  sort  of  home  market  in  which  the  planter 
obtained  twenty  or  thirty  cents  per  pound.  By  degrees,  however,  the  near 
supply  rose  above  the  near  demand,  and  it  became  necessary  to  seek  for 

manufacturing  population  of  that  country  increase  during  the  next  ten  years  in  the  ratio 
in  which  it  has  done  during  the  last,  it  will  become  necessary,  in  order  to  employ  them,  to 
secure  a  permanent  and  cheap  supply  of  cotton.  This  can  be  done,  he  thinks,  by  culti- 
vating it  in  British  India,  where,  on  the  authority  of  Major-general  Briggs,  Sir  Charles 
Forbes,  and  others,  there  can  be  produced  a  supply  sufficient  for  the  wants  of  the  entire 
world,  equal  in  quality  to  the  article  supplied  from  New  Orleans,  and  cheaper  than  it  by 
one-half.  He  states  the  wages  of  American  slave  labour  to  be  equal  to  about  Is.  Grf.  per 
day,  while  that  of  the  free  Hindoo  is  only  about  two  pence.  The  advantages  to  be  derived 
from  such  a  course,  he  stated  to  be  the  certainty  of  a  good  and  adequate  supply  at  a  cheap 
rate,  the  consolidation  of  our  Indian  possessions  by  the  means  of  commerce,  and  the  eman- 
cipation of  the  American  slaves,  by  rendering  their  labour  profitless  to  the  owners. 

*  The  "  London  Chronicle,"  of  a  late  date,  has  an  article  showing  that  the  efforts  which 
have  been  put  forth  during  the  last  few  years  to  make  India  a  cotton-growing  country 
that  might  rival  the  United  States  have  entirely  failed.  It  notices  the  failure  and  aban- 
donment of  the  experiments  in  cotton  cultivation  that  have  been  carried  on,  under  Dr. 
Wight's  superintendence,  at  Madras.  This  enterprise,  which  had  for  its  object  the  pro- 
duction of  an  article  less  palpably  inferior  to  the  cotton  of  America  than  the  present  bauly- 
picked  and  indifferent  Indian  commodity,  was  zealously,  and  even  lavishly,  supported  by 
the  local  government;  but  the  late  failure  of  a  similar  experiment  in  Bengal,  after  an 
outlay  of  about  £100,000,  had  already  given  fair  warning  of  the  probable  issue  of  Dr. 
Wight's  efforts  in  the  sister  presidency,  and  with  its  abandonment  would  seem  to  settle 
the  question  that  India  will  not  again  become,  as  it  once  was,  a  great  cotton-growing 
country.  In  1796  America  did  not  export  a  single  pound.  In  1834  she  exported  as  much 
as  all  the  rest  of  the  world  put  together.  And  in  1846,  out  of  467,8C'6,274  L,s.  imported 
into  this  country,  401,949,893  Ibs.  came  from  the  United  States,  while  only  34.550,143 
were  supplied  by  the  East  Indies  and  Ceylon !  The  total  value  supplied  from  India  in 
18*5  did  not  exceed  £600,000. 


106 


THE    HARMONY  OF    INTERESTS*. 


markets  for  cloth  and  yarn  in  India  and  China,  in  which  the  price  realized 
by  the  producer  could  not  exceed  that  at  which  it  could  there  be  sold,  mim/a 
the  difference  of  transportation.  The  necessary  effect  of  this  was  to  diminish 
the  productiveness  of  Indian  labour,  and  the  power  to  consume  cotton,  and  of 
course  to  increase  the  quantity  to  be  forced  upon  the  world,  and  with  every 
step  in  course  of  this  operation,  there  has  been  increased  competition  on  the 
part  of  the  American  grower;  the  result  of  which  is,  that  the  Indian  pro- 
ducer is  ruined,  and  the  American  one  is  saved  from  ruin  only  by  destructive 
operations  of  nature,  frosts,  freshets,  and  crevasses,  by  aid  of  which  the 
supply  is  retained  within  the  limits  of  demand. 

The  average  consumption  of  this  country  is  not  less  than  thirteen,  and  is, 
most  probably,  fifteen  pounds  per  head ;  and  it  is  less,  by  at  least  one-half, 
than  it  would  be  but  for  the  heavy  cost,  in  labour,  to  the  consumer.  The 
average  consumption  of  the  world,  outside  of  the  Union,  is  little  more  than 
one  pound  per  head,  or  about  one-thirtieth  of  what  it  ought  to  be ;  and 
yet  cotton  has  become  almost  the  weed  of  the  world,  and  men  are  every- 
where desiring  to  substitute  in  its  place  something  that  could  be  better  grown 
elsewhere.  On  the  high  lands  they  substitute  wheat,  which  would  grow 
better  farther  north.  On  the  low  lands  they  raise  sugar,  which  would  be 
much  more  productive  farther  south.  Here  are  serious  discords,  and  it  is 
important  that  we  trace  the  cause  of  their  existence,  with  a  view  to  provide  a 
remedy  for  a  state  of  things  so  unnatural. 

With  a  view  that  we  may  do  so,  I  give  the  following 

SUMMARY  STATEMENT  OF  CROPS,  CONSUMPTION,  Ac.,  OF  AMERICAN  COTTON.  FOR  TWELVE 

YEARS.* 


Total  am't. 

Crops,  as 

Consumed 

Stock  at 

Imports  of  American 

of      Ameri- 

Stock of 

Average 

shown  by 

in  the 

the  ports 

Cotton  into  Great 

can    Cotton 

Am.  Cot- 

quot. of 

receipts  the 

U.  States, 

end  of  the 

Britain,  from  1st  Jan. 

consumed 

ton  in  Gt.   Uplands 

31st  Aug. 

year  end'g 

year 

to  31st  Dec. 

in  Oreat 

Britain, 

in  Liver- 

31st Aug. 

31st  Aug. 

Britain. 

Dec.  31. 

pool. 

1836—7 

1,422,930 

222,540 

109,036 

1837 

844,812 

778,492 

158,100 

7  d. 

1837—8 

1,801,497 

246,063 

68,961 

1838 

1,124,800 

913,328 

316,100 

1 

1838—9 

1,360,532 

276,018 

69,963 

1839 

814,500 

813,488  242,300 

|l 

1839-40 

2,177,835 

295,193 

78,780 

1840 

1,237,500 

1,018,7841403,000 

6 

1840—1 

1,631,945 

297,288 

72,479 

1841 

902,500 

809,900!  344,  600 

6; 

1841—2 

1,684,211 

267,850 

31,807 

1842 

1,013,400 

893,256  373,400 

5- 

1842—3 

2,379,460 

325,129 

94,486 

1843 

1,396,800 

1,110,046  593,200 

4 

1843—4 

2,030,409 

348,744 

159,772 

1844 

1,246,900 

1,126,008 

654,900 

4- 

1844—5 

2,415,448 

389,006 

98,420 

1845 

1,499,600 

1,289,808 

809,100 

t4' 

1845—6 

2,100,537 

422,597 

107,122 

1846 

937,000 

1,280,096 

397,800 

4 

1846—7 

1,778,651 

427,967 

214,837 

1847 

874,100 

867,516 

286,200 

6^ 

1847—8 

2,347,634 

531,772 

171,468 

1848 

1,375,400 

1,189,500 

348,300 

4; 

The  stock  in  our  own  ports,  Aug.  81,  1836,  appears  to  have  been,        109,000 
That  of  American  cotton  in  English  ports,  ...  90.000J 

The  crops  of  the  twelve  years,  from  1836-7  to  1847-8,  were        23,571,000 
To  which  must  be  added,  for  the  additional  consumption  in  the 

South  and  West,  in  the  last  two  years,  -        -        -  125,000 

Total,  -        -      Id,  805,000 

The  stock  in  port,  and  in  G.  B.  at  the  close  of  the  season  1847-8,        620,000 

Consumption  of  twelve  years,      -        -      23,375,000 
Thus  divided— English,  ....        12,100,000 

American,         -        -      4.052,000 
Additional,  as  above,          125,000 

4,177,000 

Leaving  for  the  rest  of  the  world,  7,098,000 


23,375,000 


'  From  the  New  York  Courier  and  Inquirer. 
t  Duty.  /srf-  Per  lb-  taken  off  b7  Act  °f  Parliament,  passed  8th  May,  1845. 
*  The  imports  of  1837  exceeded  the  consumption  by  66,000  bales,  and  the  stock,  at  th«j 
close  of  the  year,  was  158,000,  from  which,  if  we  deduct  the  66,JOO,  there  remain  92,000. 


THE    HARMONY  OF    INTERESTS.                           107 

Average  of  the  first  Two  Years.  Total  Average.           Average  of  lart  Two  Tear* 

English,       .        .     846,000            .  1,008,000            .            1,028,000 

American,        .          235,000            .  348,000            .               542,000 

Allother,     .        .     444,000            .  591,000            .               548,000* 


1,525,000  1,947,000  2,118,000 

From  this  we  see  that  the  average  consumption  of  the  twelve  years  ex- 
ceeded that  of  the  first  two,  in  the  following  ratio: — 

English, 18  per  cent. 

American,    .        .        .        .        .     60     "      " 
All  other,         ....          22     "      " 

But  when  we  compare  the  first  and  last  two  years  of  the  period,  we  ob- 
tain the  following  results: — 

English, 21  per  cent. 

American,    .  •                .         .         .  125    "      " 
All  other 23    "      " 

The  portion  of  Europe  that  has  most  fully  adopted  the  system  of  protec- 
tion being  the  Zoll-vereinj  it  will  be  useful  to  compare  the  growth  in  their 
consumption  with  that  of  Great  Britain  and  Ireland. 

The  imports  of  raw  cotton  into  Prussia  before  the  formation  of  the  Tariff- 
league  or  Zoll-verein,  remained  from  1827  to  1835  stationary  at  44,000 
cwts.  per  annum.J  That  of  yarn  increased  from  1823  to  1835,  from  61,000 
to  115,000  cwts.  The  total  increase  of  twelve  years,  was  from  105  to 
159,000  cwts.,  or  from  30  to  45,000  bales.  The  following  shows  the  growth 
from  that  period  in  the  territories  of  the  confederation  : — 

Average  from 

1836.  1837  to  1841.  1843.  1845. 

Raw  cotton,  quintals          .         .         152,364  200,093  306,731  443,887 

Cotton  twist  and  wadding,  do.  .         244,869  351.884  475,564  574,303 


397,233          551,977          782,295        1,018,190 

The  quantity  has  more  than  doubled,  and  the  home  consumption  has 
increased  about  75  per  cent.§  in  a  period  during  most  part  of  which 
our  own  consumption  had  remained  stationary.il  The  quantity  of  twist 
and  wadding  imported  from  Great  Britain  had  increased  135  per  cent, 
in  a  shorter  period  than  was  required  in  the  latter  for  an  increase  in 
her  home  and  foreign  consumption  of  only  21  per  cent.  The  power  to 
import  thus  grew  with  the  power  of  production.  It  is  obvious  that  the  con- 
sumption tends,  and  must  tend,  to  increase  most  rapidly  where  there  is 
the  least  intervention  between  the  producer  and  the  consumer,  and  equally 
so  that  the  English  demand,  based  upon  the  principle  of  intervention  between 
the  two,  and  consequent  increase  of  cost  to  the  consumer,  cannot  be  largely 
and  permanently  increased.  That  of  1846-7  was  less  than  that  of  1837-8, 
and  the  difference  between  that  of  1839-40  and  that  of  1847-8,  great  as 
was  the  fall  of  prices,  was  but  171,000  bales. 

The  great  increase  in  the  consumption  of  the  Zoll-verein  is  due  to  pro- 

*  This  period  embraces  a  season  of  war  and  convulsion  over  the  whole  continent 

•f  De  Bow's  Commercial  Review,  Vol.  V.  p.  267. 

$  Merchants'  Magazine,  Vol.  XIII.  p.  286.  §  Ibid. 

|  The  increase  of  consumption  after  the  formation  of  the  Union  was  very  rapid.  As 
early  as  1838,  it  was  said,  that  uThe  cotton  manufacture  of  Saxony  had  already  become 
of  twice  the  extent  it  had  reached  before  the  Union." — Porter 't  Progress  of  the  Nation, 
Vol.  II.  p.  198.  The  quantity  of  cotton  hosiery  made  in  Saxony  has  increased  immeiisely 
of  late,  and  from  its  cheapness  has  not  only  secured  the  monopoly  of  the  markets  «/f  th» 
Union,  but  has  also  been  shipped  largely  to  the  United  States. 


108 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 


tection.  If,  now,  from  the  additional  British  consumption  we  deduct  the 
additional  yarn  sent  to  this  one  protected  country,  we  shall  be  enabled  to 
see  how  trivial  is  the  power  of  increase  in  the  unprotected  world.  rru'" 
account  will  then  stand  thus: — 


The 


First  two  year*. 

Last  two  years. 

English 
Zoll-verein  (1836)  . 
American 
All  other 

846,000 
100,000 
235,000 
344,000 

958,000* 
230,000* 
542,000 
378,000 

Ratio  of  increase. 
13  per  cent. 
130          «  « 

125         « 
10        « 

In  the  one  case  England  took  846,000  at  7d.,  total        .        $53,000,000 
In  the  other,  958,000  at  5drf.       ...  .          48,000,000 

In  both,  the  price  was  fixed  in  her  own  ports,  and  regulated 
by  her  own  power  of  purchase.  Had  our  home  consumption 
absorbed  200,000  additional  bales,  thus  reducing  the  supply  to 
750,000,  the  price  would  have  been  8d.  and  the  amount  would 

have  been $54,000,000 

and  the  product  of  the  whole  crop  would  have  been  almost  doubled. 

The  consequence  of  this  incapacity  of  extending  her  foreign  market  is, 
of  course,  the  accumulation  of  large  quantities  in  English  ports,  accompanied 
by  a  fall  of  prices,  by  aid  of  which  the  English  consumer  obtains  a  larger 
quantity  for  the  labour  that  he  can  afford  to  give  in  exchange  for  the  mate- 
rials of  clothing,  and  that  tends  to  decrease  as  his  labour  becomes  more 
unproductive,  and  as  the  disposition  to  "fly  from  ills  they  know"  increases. 
This  will  be  seen  by  the  following  table : — 


Crop.           Bales.                 Average  price. 

1839—1,368,000 

14-5  cents. 

1840—2,180,000 

8-6 

1841—1,634,000 

10-3 

1842—1,684,000 

8-2 

1843—2,388,000 

6 

1844—2,030,000 

8-1 

1846—2,100,000 

5-9 

1846—2,101,000 

7-8 

1847—1,778,000 

10-1 

1848—2,347,000 

7 

British  and  Irish  consumption. 
Quantity. 

73,000,000  pounds. 
172,000,000 

97,000,000 

97,000,000 
120,000,000 
124,000,000 
164,000,000 
147,000,000 

77,000,000 
130,000,000 


1,961,000 


8-6 


1,201,000,000 


Value. 
$10,585,000 

14,620,000 
9,991.000 
7,954,000 
7,200,000 

10,116,000 
9,696,000 

10,731,000 
7,777,000 
9,100,000 

9,777,000 


The  total  home  consumption  by  the  27,500,000  composing  the  population 
of  the  United  Kingdom,  was  thus  but  1,200,000,000  pounds,  or  an  average 
of  120,000,000  per  annum,  giving  4j  pounds  to  each  individual,  supplied 
at  a  cost  so  low  as  to  ruin  the  producer.  The  average"  of  the  first  two  years 
was  122,500,000,  while  that  of  the  last  two  years  was -but  102,500,000,  not- 
withstanding an  increase  of  population  that  should  have  brought  it  up  to 
140,000,000. 

From  this  statement  it  appears  clearly  that  the  power  of  the  people  of 
Great  Britain  and  Ireland,  to  be  customers  to  the  cotton  planters  of  the  world, 
cannot  go  much  beyond  $10,000,000;  and  that,  instead  of  increasing  with 
the  population,  it  tends  decidedly  to  diminish.  The  reason  of  this  appears 
to  me  obvious.  The  people  of  England  are  perpetually  engaged  in  the 
effort  to  sell  the  products  of  their  labour  in  distant  markets,  in  competition  with 
low-priced  labour,  and  therefore  at  the  lowest  price;  receiving  payment  in 
food  and  other  articles  of  consumption  produced  in  distant  markets,  which 
come  to  them  burdened  with  enormous  cost  of  transportation,  and  therefore 

•  I  have  deducted  and  added  only  70,000  bales,  supposing  the  last  two  years'  export 
not  to  have  been  as  great  as  that  of  1845. 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  109 

sbtained  at  the  cost  of  much  labour.  The  natural  growth  of  production 
elsewhere  tends  to  increase  the  supply  of  raw  materials,  but  the  power  to  pay 
for  them  does  not  increase,  because  the  labour  of  British  subjects,  home  and 
colonial,  instead  of  becoming  more  productive  of  commodities  to  be  given  in 
exchange,  is  becoming  Jess  so  from  month  to  month  and  from  year  to  year, 
and  yet  into  that  constantly  diminishing  market  are  thrown  all  the  surplus 
products  of  the  world,  that  the  price  cf  the  whole  product  may  there  be 
fixed.  The  effect  of  this  is  to  throw  on  the  planters  the  loss  that  should 
belong  to  themselves,  and  thus  enable  them  to  supply  themselves  at  the 
lowest  price ;  whereas,  whenever  the  cotton  planter  shall  cease  to  be  depend- 
ent upon  them  for  his  market,  they  will  again,  as  formerly,  be  obliged  to 
buy  at  the  highest  price.  The  product  of  British  labour,  measured  in  the  arti- 
cle of  first  necessity,  food,  is  small,  and  the  surplus  remaining,  to  be  applied  to 
the  purchase  of  clothing,  is  therefore  very  small  indeed.  They  are  in- 
cessantly engaged  in  supplying  low-priced,  and  often  worthless  clothing 
to  the  world,  and  are  therefore  unable  to  clothe  themselves. 

That  the  tendency  is  downward,  seems  scarcely  to  admit  of  a  doubt.  A 
few  years  since,  by  a  great  effort,  the  poor-rates  of  England  were  reduced 
to  less  than  j64,000,000.  They  have  since  risen  gradually,  and  those 
of  1848  were  £7,817,000,  or  $38,000,000.  Every  ninth  person  is  a 
pauper.  In  Scotland,  the  destitution  of  a  large  portion  of  the  population  is 
frightful.  The  people  of  the  Northern  and  Western  Highlands  are  in  a 
state  of  pauperism ;  and  Glasgow  and  its  vicinity  present  a  scene  of  wretch- 
edness scarcely,  if  at  all,  to  be  exceeded  in  the  world.  Ireland  is  exhausted. 
There  being  no  separate  accounts  of  the  imports  into  that  kingdom,  it  is  not 
possible  to  ascertain  the  present  consumption  of  cotton,  but  the  condition  of 
the  people  is  now  far  lower  than  at  the  dates  of  the  following  returns: — 

The  whole  import  of  cotton  into  Ireland  from  all  parts  of  the  world,  in  the 
twenty  years  from  1802  to  1821  both  inclusive,  amounted  to  538,542  hun- 
dred weights,  or  about  150,000  bales,  being  an  average  of  7500  bales  per 
annurnj  and  the  whole  import  of  cotton  yarn,  to  19,995,350  pounds,  or  about 
1,000,000  pounds  per  annum,  the  product  of  about  4000  bales,  making  a 
total  of  11,500  bales.*  The  amount  of  cloth  imported  is  not  given. 

In  1825,  the  year  of  great  expansion  everywhere,  with  an  export  to 
Great  Britain  of  agricultural  products,  amounting  to  almost  $35,000,000,  we 
find  the  import  of  cotton-wool  to  have  been  4,065,930  pounds,  and  the  im- 
port of  cotton  cloth  to  have  been  4,996,885  yards,  making  -in  the  whole 
about  6,000,000  pounds,  or  about  18,000  bales  of  cotton,  in  all  its  forms,  re- 
quired for  the  supply  of  almost  8,000,000  people ;  being  about  three-quarters 
of  a  pound  per  head. 

In  subsequent  years,  no  information  can  be  obtained,  owing  to  changes  in 
the  mode  of  keeping  the  custom-house  accounts  ;  but  in  a  general  report  on 
the  state  of  the  trade  of  Ireland,  made  by  a  committee  whose  object  would 
not  have  been  promoted  by  under-estimates,  it  is  stated  that  the  import  of 
cotton-cloth  into  that  kingdom  was,  in  1835,  14,172,000  yards,  being  equal 
to  about  4,000,000  pounds  of  cotton,  or  half  a  pound  per  head.  What 
quantity  of  cotton-wool,  or  yarn,  was  imported  at  that  time,  cannot  be  ascer- 
tained, but  it  is  elsewhere  shown  that  some  of  the  largest  establishments  for 
manufacture,  of  a  period  somewhat  earlier,  had  disappeared,  and  that  the 
calico  printers  were  in  a  state  of  bankruptcy .t 

We  may  now  look  to  the  consumption  of  the  colonies  of  Great  Britain. 
In  the  years  1845,  '46,  '47,  the  export  to  them  was  as  follows,:}:  in  millions 
of  pounds  -.—1845,  85 ;  1846,  87 ;  1847,  67.  Of  this,  however,  large 

*  Ireland  before  and  since  the  Union,  by  R.  Montgomery  Martin,  pages  56  to  60.  f  Ibid 

*  Merchants'  Magazine,  Vol.  XIX.  600. 


110  THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 

quantities  went  to  Gibraltar,  Malta,  Jamaica,  and  other  places,  to  be  smuggled 
into  Spain,  Mexico,  and  other  countries,  and  the  consumption  of  the  colonies 
of  themselves  could  not  have  exceeded  70,000,000,  or  about  170,000  ba-ies, 
for  more  than  100,000,000  of  inhabitants.  During  this  time,  the  average 
price  was  a  fraction  over  7  cents,  and  it  follows  that  $5,000,000  is  the 
maximum  amount  of  trade  maintained,  through  the  medium  of  England,  by 
the  planting  States  of  the  Union,  with  a  large  portion  of  the  people  of  the 
world,  although  producing  two-thirds  of  the  whole  quantity  of  this  necessary 
commodity  for  the  use  of  the  world. 

Taking  the  total  consumption  of  the  United  Kingdom  and  the  colonies, 
we  now  have  the  following  quantities  : — 

1845.  1846.  1847. 

Millions  of  pounds        .         .         239         .         234         .         144 

Need  any  better  evidence  be  desired  of  the  poverty  inflicted  by  the  sys- 
tem upon  all  the  people  subject  to  it,  than  the  fact  that  an  increase  of  price 
equal  to  one  cent  per  yard  reduces  the  consumption  almost  one-half? 

Let  this  be  compared  with  the  growth  of  consumption  in  the  protected 
markets  of  Germany  and  the  United  States,  and  it  will  be  seen  how  steady 
is  the  protected,  or  real  free-trade,  system,  compared  with  the  perpetual 
change  of  the  monopoly  one.  How  great,  too,  the  difference  in  the  con- 
sumption per  head ! 

While  England  and  all  her  vast  possessions  consumed  but     144,000,000 
the  consumption  of  the  Zoll-verein  (population  25,000,000) 
had  grown  in  nine  years  from  45,000,000  to       .         .         .     115,000,000 
and  that  of  the  Union  was 243,000,000 

We  have  seen  how  slow  has  been  the  growth  of  the  English  demand,  and 
it  may  now  be  well  to  see  the  wasteful  and  exhausting  process  by  which  even 
this  has  been  obtained.  "The  extremely  low  price  of  cotton,"  say  Messrs. 
Rathbone,  Brothers  &  Co.,*  "  has  encouraged  the  manufacture  of  a  very  in- 
ferior class  of  goods,  which  require  a  great  weight  of  cotton  compared  to  the 
labour  expended  on  them,  and  of  which  the  make  ceases  entirely  when  cotton 
is  moderately  high.  The  demand  for  very  coarse  yarn,"  they  continue,  "  is 
always  large  at  very  cheap  prices,  but  in  the  year  just  closed  it  has  ex- 
ceeded all  precedent^  particularly  for  export,  chiefly  to  the  Levant,  and  in 
some  instances  to  accelerate  its*  make,  it  has  not  passed  through  all  the 
usual  processes.  It  is  on  the  consumption  of  cotton  for  these  classes  of 
goods,"  they  add,  "that  even  a  moderate  advance  in  prices  is  apt  so  imme- 
diately to  tell."  The  cotton  thus  forced  into  the  Levant  goes  to  the  same 
countries  that  before  were  supplied  from  India,  and  thus  is  the  poor  Hindoo 
deprived  of  another  portion  of  his  market,  the  necessary  consequence  of 
which  must  be  a  further  depression  of  prices,  and  increased  inability  to  con- 
tinue the  work  of  production.  The  decline  in  the  trade  of  Western  India 
is  remarkable,  and  is  probably  the  result  of  this  flooding  of  the  Asiatic 
markets  with  half-made  cotton  goods.J 

*  Circular,  January  3d,  1849. 

•f  The  prices  of  ordinary  cotton  ranging  during  a  large  portion  of  the  year,  from 
3d.  to  4d. 

$  The  average  import?  of  Bombay  for  the  five  years  ending  December  31,  1846,  were 
63,000,000  of  rupees,  while  those  of  1846  were  only  52,000,000.  The  exports  were  as 
follows : — 

5  years  ending  December  31, 1846.  1846. 

Cotton,         .         bales         .         380,987          ....          257,743 


Wool, 
Coffee, 
Pepper 
Indigo, 


Ibs.  .  3,421,976  ....  4,626,470 

ibs.  .  3,140,821  ....  1,529,900 

cwts.  .  47,260  ....  46,182 

Ibs.  .  135,833  ....  55,928 


Ivory  cwts.         .  5,764          ....  6 109 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  Ill 

4t  has  been  seen  how  large  was  the  export  to  India  in  the  first  six  months 
of  the  year,  and  now  we  see  by  the  newspapers  of  the  day  what  are  the 
consequences.  Low  as  was  the  price  of  cotton,  the  speculation  has  not 
answered.  The  markets  are  glutted,  and  the  prices  are  unremunerative. 
"Great  caution,"  it  is  said,  "  must  now  be  exercised,  or  the  exporting  houses 
will  suffer  exceedingly."*  The  small  rise  in  price  has  already  caused 
'Many  mills  to  commence  working  short-time,  and  the  operatives  in  them  are 
thus  deprived  of  the  power  to  purchase  clothing.  It  is  the  most  gambling, 
and  most  extraordinary  system,  and  the  most  destructive  to  the  interests  of 
the  agricultural  population  of  the  world  that  has  ever  been  devised.  The 
fever  and  the  chill  succeed  each  other  with  such  rapidity  that  we  are 
scarcely  advised  of  the  arrival  of  the  one,  before  we  see  indications  of  the 
approach  of  the  other.  The  cause  of  this  difficulty  of  extending  the  sale 
of  cotton  in  distant  markets  is  to  be  found  in  the  fact  that  the  labour-cost  of 
cloth  so  obtained  is  great.  We  have  seen  that  the  extension  of  the  manu- 
facture in  this  country  for  a  few  years  following  the  passage  of  the  tariff  of 
1828  was  rapid,  and  that  it  then  became  almost  stationary  under  the  Com- 
promise, yet  the  import  not  only  did  not  increase  but  decreased  until  it 
reached  the  lowest  point  in  the  period  of  1842-43.  The  labour-cost  of 
clothing  was  steadily  increasing,  but  as  the  tariff  of  1842  came  into  operation 
the  labour-cost  diminished,  and  there  arose  a  power  to  pay  for  finer  cloths 
from  abroad,  and  thus  the  import  and  manufacture  increased  together.  If 
we  desire  to  see  the  operation  of  this,  we  need  only  take  a  single  farmer 
of  Tennessee  or  Kentucky,  who  obtains  30  or  40  bushels  of  corn  in  return 
for  the  labour  bestowed  on  an  acre  of  land,  and  is  happy  to  sell  it  at  20  cents 
per  bushel,t  when  the  price  in  Liverpool  is  75  or  80  cents.  Thirty-five 
bushels  yield  here  $7,  which  is  about  the  cost  of  70  yards  of  tolerable  cotton- 
cloth,  plain  and  printed,  when  received  on  his  farm.  To  produce  those  70 
yards  would  require  20  pounds  of  cotton,  or  one-twentieth  of  the  product 
of  a  well-cultivated  acre.  To  convert  those  pounds  into  yards  of  cloth 
requires  far  less  than  half  the,  capital,  and  half  the  labour  required  for  their 
original  production.  Taking,  however,  the  conversion  at  one  half,  and  adding 
that  proportion  to  the  number  of  pounds,  we  obtain  the  equivalent  of  30 
pounds  of  raw  cotton  as  the  return  for  35  bushels  of  corn,  and  yet  that  corn 
sells,  at  the  place  of  consumption,  for  as  much  as  would  purchase  almost  a  bale 
of  cotton.  It  is  obvious  t'Lat  though  the  money-price  of  the  cloth  is  low,  the 
labour-price  is  high,  and  it  is  by  the  latter  that  the  power  of  consumption  is 
measured.  The  cloth,  too,  is  worthless.  As  far  back  as  1832,  the  quantity  of 
flour  required  for  the  use  of  the  cotton  factories  of  England  was  stated  at  forty- 
two  millions  of  pounds, $  or  almost  as  much  as  the  weight  of  100,000  bales 
of  cotton,  all  of  which  is  traded  off  as  cotton,  to  the  poor  consumers  of  dis- 
tant lands,  who  are  thus  defrauded  and  impoverished. 

Bad  as  is  even  this,  it  is  far  from  all  the  loss  that  is  sustained.  The  corn 
is  sent  from  the  land,  and  the  farmer  loses  the  refuse.  The  land  is  impo- 
verished, and  its  occupant  is  compelled  to  fly  to  other  lands,  to  be  again  im- 
poverished. The  loss  from  this  source  alone  is  far  more  than  the  value  of 
all  the  imports  into  the  Union,  of  every  description,from  all  the  manufactur- 
ing nations  of  the  world.  The  apparently  cheap  clothing  is  very  dear.  It 
is  obtained  at  the  cost  of  much  labour,  and  of  little  value  when  obtained. 

*  Morning  Herald,  November. 

•{•  "  Tennessee  grows  more  corn  than  any  State  of  the  Union.  A  few  months  since  we 
took  the  liberty  to  ask  a  farmer  from  Tennessee  who  had  a  drove  of  hogs  in  cur  streets, 
the  price  of  corn  in  the  region  from  whence  he  came.  He  replied  that  it  was  worth  ten 
cents,  and  wheat  fifty  cents  a  bushel." — Augusta  Chronicle,  May,  1849. 

$  MeCulloch's  Commercial  Dictionary,  article  Cotton. 


112 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 


What  is  true  of  Tennessee  and  India,  is  equally  so  of  the  othei  parts  of  the 
world  that  are  compelled  to  depend  on  England  for  supplies  ot  cotton  cloth. 
The  poor  Russian  obtains  less  than  a  pound  of  cotton  for  a  bushel  of  wheat, 
and  thus  he  gives  ten  days'  labour  for  one ;  whereas,  if  he  could  have 
cotton  converted  on  the  spot,  by  the  man  who  ate  his  food,  he  would  obtain 
day's  labour  for  day's  labour.  So  is  it  with  the  German,  the  South  Ameri- 
can, the  Mexican,  the  Italian,  the  Spaniard,  and  the  Turk.  The  system  tends 
to  prevent  concentration  and  combination  of  action,  and  to  diminish  the  value 
of  labour  throughout  the  world,  and  it  is  because  of  this,  that  almost  all  na- 
tions are  endeavouring  to  shut  out  the  manufactures  of  Great  Britain. 
Everywhere,  however,  they  are  met  by  the  smuggler,  now  regarded  by  the 
highest  authorities  of  Great  Britain  as  the  greatest  of  reformers.  Gibraltar 
is  maintained  for  the  purpose  of  smuggling  goods  into  Spain.  Exhausted  Por- 
tugal receives  millions  of  pounds  of  cotton  goods,  likewise  to  be  smuggled 
into  Spain;  and  thus  is  that  unfortunate  country  kept  in  a  state  of  poverty, 
because  the  people  of  England  are  pleased  to  believe  that  it  is  profitable  to 
buy  cloth  produced  abroad,  while  the  labourer  at  home  is  idle  for  want  of 
demand  for  his  labour,  and  the  food  perishes  on  the  ground  for  want  of 
mouths  to  eat  or  roads  to  transport  it. 

If  the  system  tends  to  the  exhaustion  of  the  people  who  have  to  buy  cot- 
ton at  so  high  a  price,  not  less  does  it  tend  to  the  exhaustion  of  those  who 
have  to  produce  it,  and  who  are  compelled  to  sell  at  whatever  price  the  peo- 
ple of  England  think  proper  to  fix  upon  it.  Why  that  is  so,  may,  perhaps, 
be  ascertained  by  an  examination  of  the  following  table : — 


Crop. 

1837—1,422,000 
1838—1,801,000 
1839—1,360,000 
1840—2,177,000 
1841—1,631,000 
1842—1,684,000 
1843—2,879,000 
1844—2,030,000 
1845—2,415,000 
1846—2,100,000 
1847—1,778,000 
1848—2,347,000 


Stock  In  Liverpool,  Deo.  81. 
Bales. 


Price. 
Id. 
7 


Gross  proceeds  of  sales  of  American 
cotton  in  Liverpool,  from  which 
are  to  be  deducted  freights,  com- 
missions, &o.  &c.  Weight  of  bole 
estimated  at  450  pounds. 

$49,000,000 
57,000,000 
57,000,000 
55,000,000 
45,000,000 
47,000,000 
47,000,000 
49,000,000 
51,000,000 
56,000,000 
61,000,000 
45,000,000 


158,000 
316,000 
242,000 
403,000 
344,000 
373,000 
593,000 
654,000 
808,000 
597,000 
286,000 
348,000 

The  quotations  of  the  latter  portion  of  the  last  year  were  below  the  aver- 
age, being  about  4rf.,  and  about  that  point  they  remained  for  several 
months,  until  the  chief  portion  of  the  crop  had  been  shipped.  The  un- 
favourable prospects  for  the  new  crop  tended  to  prevent  a  further  fall,  but  it 
is  impossible  to  tell  what  would  have  been  the  price  had  that  of  the  pre- 
sent year  increased  in  its  proper  ratio  to  the  population  engaged  in  its  pro- 
duction. It  would  certainly  have  fallen  much  below  even  fourpence.  An 
examination  of  this  table  will,  I  think,  enable  us  to  understand  the  cause  of 
the  present  extraordinary  state  of  things.  A  large  portion  of  the  crop  of 
the  present  year  has  been  destroyed  by  frosts,  freshets,  &c.,  and  that  fact, 
instead  of  bringing  with  it  distress  and  ruin,  has  brought  with  it  increased 
activity  and  life  among  planters,  and  increased  power  to  consume  cloth, 
sugar,  coffee,  &c.  Why  is  it  so  ?  The  answer  can,  I  think,  readily  be 
given. 

The  amount  that  can  be  collected  by  Great  Britain,  in  payment  for  Ameri- 
can cotton,  consumed  at  home  and  abroad,  and  for  freights,  commissions,  &c., 
appears  to  be  limited  to  somewhere  between  $45,000,000  and  $57,000,000, 


THE   HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  113 

with  an  obvious  tendency  to  diminution.  Of  the  crop  of  the  past  four  yeais, 
the  quantity  consumed  among  ourselves,  and  exported  by  us  directly  to  foreign 
ports,  has  not  varied  materially  from  1,000,000,  The  balance  has  gone  to 
England,  who  has  $57,000,000  with  which  to  pay  for  900,000  bales,  say  $63 
a  bale.  The  crop,  however,  reaches  2,400,000  bales,  and  we  send  her 
1,400,000;  all  of  which  have  to  be  compressed  within  a  smaller  sum  than 
57,000,000,  for  now  there  are  large  expenses  for  storage,  interest,  risk,  &c., 
and  the  amount  falls  to  50,000,000,  leaving  the  planter  but  $36  a  bale,  out 
of  which  he  has  to  pay  the  high  freights  consequent  upon  large  crops, 
and  upon  a  large  number  of  bales,  instead  of  that  moderate  freight  that  would 
have  accompanied  small 'ones,  and  upon  a  small  number  of  bales.  The 
price  obtained  in  England  fixes  that  of  the  crop,  and  the  result  is  as  fol- 
lows :— 

1,900,000  bales  at  $63, $120,000,000 

Less  low  freights,  at  home  and  abroad,  upon  a  small 

quantity. 
2,400,000  bales  at  $36 86,000,000 

Less  high  freights,  at  home  and  abroad,  upon  a  large 

quantity. 

tt  is  obvious  that  it  would  have  been  far  better  that  the  500,000 
bales  should  have  been  burned,  or  destroyed  by  frost  before  being  picked. 
The  crop  of  1844  was  812,000,000  pounds,  and  the  product  was  esti- 
mated at .  .  $65,772,000 

In  1845,  it  rose  to  958,000,000,  and  the  product  fell  to      .          56,000,000 
In  1847,  it  fell  to  7 11, 000,000,  worth  .    "    .        .        .        .      72,000,000 
In  1848,  it  rose  to  1,100,000,000,  and  until  the  occurrence  of 
frosts  and  freshets,  the  prospect  was  that  it  would  not  aver- 
age at  New  Orleans  more  than  5£  cents,  or  .        .       60,000,000 

The  gradual  but  steady  subjugation  of  the  planters  to  the  system  may  be 
seen  from  the  following  facts :  From  1830  to  1835,  the  price  of  cotton  here 
was  about  eleven  cents,  which  we  may  suppose  to  be  about  what  it  would 
yield  in  England,  free  of  freight  and  charges.  In  those  years  our  average 
export  was  about  320,000,000,  yielding  about  $35,000,000,  and  the  average 
price  of  cotton  cloth,  per  piece  of  24  yards,  weighing  5  Ibs.  12  oz.,  was 
7s.  l,0rf.,  ($1-88,)  and  that  of  iron  £6,  10s.,  ($31-20.)  Our  exports  would 
therefore  nave  produced  us,  delivered  in  Liverpool,  18,500,000  pieces  of 
cloth,  or  about  1,100,000  tons  of  iron.  In  1845  and  '46,  the  home  consumption 
of  the  people  of  England  was  almost  the  same  quantity,  say  311,000,000 
pounds,  and  the  average  price  here  was  6£  cents,  making  the  product 
$20,000,000.  The  price  of  cloth  then  was  6s.  6|rf.,  ($1-574,)  and  that  of 
iron  about  £10,  ($48,)  and  the  result  was,  that  we  could  have,  for  nearly  the 
same  quantity  of  cotton,  about  12,500,000  pieces  of  cloth,  or  about  420,000 
tons  of  iron,  delivered  in  Liverpool.  Dividing  the  return  between  the  two 
commodities,  it  stands  thus : — 

Average  from  1830  to  1835.  1845-6.  Loss. 

Cloth,  pieces,  9,250,000  .  6,250,000  .  3,000,000 

And  iron,  tons,  650,000  .  210,000  .  340,000 

The  labour  required  for  converting  cotton  into  cloth  had  been  greatly 
diminished,  and  yet  the  proportion  retained  by  the  manufacturers  was  greatly 
increased,  as  will  now  be  shown: — 

Weight  of  Cotton  given          Retained  by  the 
Weight  of  Cotton  used.  to  the  planters.  manufacturers. 

1830  to  1835,  -  -  320,000,000  -  110,000,000  -  210,000,000 
1845  and  1846,  -  -  ,111,000,000  -  74,000,000  -  237,000.000 


114  THE    HARMONY   OF    INTERESTS. 

In  the  first  period,  the  planter  would  have  had  34  per  cent,  of  his  cotton 
returned  to  him  in  the  form  of  cloth,  but  in  the  second  only  24  per  cent. 
The  grist  miller  gives  the  farmer  from  year  to  year  a  larger  proportion 
of  the  product  of  his  grain,  and  thus  the  latter  has  all  the  profit  of  every 
improvement.  The  cotton  miller  gives  the  planter  from  year  to  year  a 
smaller  portion  of  the  cloth  produced.  The  one  miller  comes  daily  nearer  to 
the  producer.  The  other  goes  daily  farther  from  him,  for  with  the  increased 
product  the  cost  of  transportation  is  increased. 

We  may  now  inquire  into  the  cause  of  the  accumulation  of  stock  in  the 
English  market,  and  if  that  can  be  ascertained,  we  shall  be  able  to  see  why 
it  is  that  cotton  has  fallen  so  ruinously  low. 

Of  the  crop  of  1828-29,  our  own  consumption  was      .         .         118,000 

Of  these  of  1832-33  and  1833-34,  the  average  was     .         .         195,000 

Of  that  of  1834-35,  it  was 216,000 

having  almost  doubled  in  six  years,  and  with  a  tendency  to  an  increase  in 
the  ratio  of  advance;  and  this  increase  was  attended  by  no  diminution  in  our 
consumption  of  foreign  cloth. 

Of  the  crop  of  1841-42,  we  consumed  only  .  .  .  268,000 
with  a  great  diminution  in  the  consumption  of  foreign  cloth. 

Of  that  of  1847-48,  607,000 

with  a  large  increase  in  the  consumption  of  foreign  cloth,  the  total  con- 
sumption having  much  more  than  doubled  in  a  similar  period  of  time.  In 
the  period  intermediate  between  1835  and  1843,  our  consumption  had  been 
stationary.  Had  it  not  been  interfered  with  by  the  action  of  the  Compromise 
bill,  it  would  certainly  have  doubled  in  that  period,  and  probably  much, 
more  than  doubled.  If,  however,  we  assume  an  increase  of  only  12£  per 
^ent.  per  annum,  or  quadruple  the  increase  of  population,  the  following 
vould  have  been  the  home  demand : — 

1835-6         .         .         243,000  bales        1839-40       .        .         388,000bales 


1836-7  .  .  273,000 
1837-8  .  .  307,000 
1838-9  .  .  345,000 


1840-41       .         .         437,000 
1841-42       .         .         491,000 


Total  .         .      2,484,000 

The  actual  consumption  was  .         .  ....      1,844,000 


Difference 640,000 

The  loss  of  demand  to  the  planter  was  thus  more  than  the  whole  quantity 
that  was  left  unsold  when  the  market  broke  down. 

Following  up  the  consumption  to  the  present  time  at  the  same  rate,  we 
;btain  the  following  results  : — 


1842-3         .         .         552,000  bales 

1846-7 

883,000  bales 

1843-4        .        .        621,000    « 

1847-8 

994,000    « 

1844-5        .        .        680,000    « 

1848-9      . 

.      1,019,090    « 

1845-6        .        .        785,000    « 

.  

5,550,000 

The  actual  consumption  has  been  about 

. 

.      3,000,000 

Difference  in  seven  years,               , 

2,550,000 

3,190,000 

No  one  can  doubt  that  the  progress  would  have  been  greater  than  is  here 
set  down,  and  yet  with  no  more  than  this,  we  should  have  used  above 
3,000,000  bales  that  we  have  not  used.  Had  we  done  so,  the  producer 
>f  cotton  would  have  fixed  the  price  and  not  the  buyer.  Under  such  cir- 
cumstances would  it  have  fallen  below  ten  or  twelve  cents  per  pound  ? 
Would  it  not,  on  the  contrary,  have  risen  to  fourteen  or  fifteen,  unless  the 
crop  had  been  much  increased  ?  I  think  it  would,  and  I  feel  assured  that  it 
will  do  so  in  a  very  brief  period  from  the  thorough  adoption  of  a  system 


THE    HA.RMONY   OF    INTERESTS.  115 

that  will  establish  here  such  a  market  for  labour  as  will  enable  us  to  con- 
sume on  the  land  the  products  of  the  land,  and  my  reasons  for  so  believing 
are  as  follows : — 

The  good  cotton  lands  of  India  are  now  waste.  To  render  them  productive 
requires  labour  and  capital.  To  induce  the  application  of  either,  the  labourer 
must  have  wages  and  the  owner  of  capital  must  have  profits.  Both  must 
rise  in  price  with  any  increased  demand  for  them.  Such  demand  must 
arise  when  England  shall  find  herself  compelled  to  look  to  India  for  any 
increased  supply,  as  she  must  do  so  soon  as  our  home  demand  shall  have 
risen  to  the  extent  of  1,000,000  bales  per  annum,  as  it  will  d^  in  the  next 
three  years,  if  permitted  so  to  do. 

It  will  be  asked,  what  should  we  do  with  all  this  cloth?  "In  reply,  I  say 
again,  and  I  repeat  it  because  it  is  essential  that  it  be  recollected — every 
man  is  a  consumer  to  the  whole  extent  of  his  production,  whatever  that 
may  be.  Had  the  tariff  of  1828  remained  unchanged,  the  production  of  coal 
in  the  same  period  would  have  reached  15,000,000  tons,  for  furnaces  and 
rolling-mills  would  have  been  built  throughout  the  country,  and  railroad 
bars  would  have  been  made  by  hundreds  of  thousands  of  tons,  and  treble  the 
roads  would  have  been  madq^without  producing  bankruptcy.  The  demand 
for  roads,  and  mills,  and  furnaces,  and  steam-engines  of  every  description 
would  have  created  a  vast  demand  for  labour  that  was  wasted,  and  the  surplus 
earnings  would  have  gone  to  the  purchase  of  clothing  and  other  of  the  con- 
veniences and  comforts  of  life,  and  there  would  have  been  made  a  market 
on  the  land  for  the  products  of  the  land,  to  the  extent  of  hundreds  of  rni'lions 
of  dollars,  enabling  both  farmer  and  planter  to  improve  the  machinery  of 
production  and  transportation,  growing  rich  instead  of  remaining  poor  as  they 
have  done.  With  each  such  step  the  immigration  from  Europe  would  have 
increased,  and  as  every  man  would  at  once  have  become  a  producer,  every 
one  woujd  have  been  a  consumer.  The  Englishman  would  consume  twelve 
pounds,  where  before  he  consumed  but  four,  and  the  Irishman  would  con- 
sume twelve  where  before  he  consumed  but  one,  while  freights  to  Europe 
would  be  so  far  reduced  that  the  price  of  cotton  in  New  York  would  be 
almost  as  high  as  in  Liverpool. 

It  will  be  observed  that  the  quantity  here  set  down  for  1846-7  exceeds., 
by  only  one-third,  that  which  we  actually  did  consume.  Had  immigration 
continued  to  increase,  from  1834  to  the  present  time,  at  the  rate  at  which  it 
was  then  advancing,  our  population  would  be  greater  than  it  now  is  by  20 
per  cent.,  providing  for  nearly  the  whole  quantity,  without  any  allowance  for 
increased  consumption  by  the  population  previously  existing.  The  whole 
of  them  would  have  needed  large  supplies  of  coffee,  silk,  and  a  thousand 
other  things  from  abroad,  for  much  of  which  we  should  have  paid  in 
cotton  goods.  The  facility  of  obtaining  iron  would  have  given  roads  to 
the  farmer  and  planter,  and  all  would  have  had  more  of  the  proceeds  of  their 
labour  to  apply  to  the  purchase  of  clothing.  The  planter  himself,  and  his 
people,  would  now  be  consuming  three  yards  where  now  they  consume  but 
one ;  and  the  home-market  would  now  be  absorbing  1,200,000  bales,  in- 
stead of  a  million.  What  then  would  be  the  price  of  cotton,  even  with  a  crop 
of  3,000,000?  Would  it  not  be  $60  a  bale,  yielding  him  180  millions  in- 
stead of  80  ?  I  think  it  would. 

In  1845  and  1846,  the  planter  supplied  311,000,000  of  pounds,  for  which, 
delivered  on  the  sea-board,  he  could  have  had  74,000,000  Ibs.  delivered  in 
Liverpool,  the  freight  and  commissions,  homeward,  being  paid  by  him.  He 
gave  156,000,000  for  37,000,000,  the  charges  upon  which,  without  duty, 
would  have  reduced  it  to  30,000,000  on  the  plantation,  and  probably  less. 
The  30,000,000  had,  however,  been  twisted  and  woven,  and  the  difference, 


116 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 


one  hundred  and  twenty-six  millions,  was  what  he  gave  for  the  twisting 
and  weaving  of  thirty  millions.  The  average  work  of  operatives,  men  and 
women,  boys  and  girls,  exceeds  the  conversion  of  3000  pounds  of  cotton  into 
such  cloth,  per  annum.  The  planter,  then,  gave  126,000,000  of  pounds  of 
cotton  for  the  labour  of  10,000  persons,  chiefly  boys  and  girls,  and  he  trans- 
ported 156,000,000  to  market.  Were  he  to  calculate  the  cost  of  transporta- 
tion from  the  plantation  to  Nashville,  or  other  place  of  shipment,  he  would 
find  that  that  alone  was  far  more  than  the  labour  he  obtained  in  return,  and 
that  he  had  in  fact  given  the  cotton  itself  away,  receiving  for  it  no  equivalent 
whatever. 

Had  the  whole  156,000,000  been  converted  at  home  into  cloth,  it  would 
have  amounted  to  about  seven  pounds  additional,  per  head,  for  the  people  of 
the  Union,  and  it  would  then  have  been  consumed  at  home,  for  the  con- 
sumption of  the  South  would  then  have  risen  to  a  level  with  the  present 
consumption  of  the  North,  and  the  latter  would  have  largely  increased,  be- 
cause of  the  great  demand  for  labour  that  would  have  existed.  Had  that 
been  done,  the  price  of  the  whole  crop  would  have  been  6rf.  instead  of  4£rf., 
and  the  planter  would  have  received  seven  cents  per  pound,  additional,  on 
900,000,000  of  pounds,  or  sixty-three  millions  of  dollars — and  that,  large  a 
sum  as  it  is,  is  but  a  part  of  the  benefit  that  would  have  resulted  from  such 
a  course  of  operation. 

It  will  be  said  that  high  prices  would  arrest  consumption.  If  so,  how  im- 
portant it  is  to  the  producer  to  cut  off  the  enormous  charges  of  the  host  of 
persons  that  now  intervene  between  himself  and  those  who  desire  to  con- 
sume his  products.  High  prices,  consequent  upon  the  maintenance  of  the 
existing  system,  do  arrest  it,  because  they  are  a  tax  upon  both  producer  and 
consumer.  Such  prices  realized  by  the  former,  consequent  upon  an  in- 
creased facility  of  exchanging  with  the  latter,  would  produce  a  contrary 
effect.  They  would  increase  it;  for  we  should  obtain  more  from  all 
the  world  for  what  we  had  to  sell,  and  our  own  consumption  would  in- 
crease more  rapidly.  The  increasing  emigration  to  this  country  would  raise 
the  value  of  man  abroad,  and  those  whom  we  now  see  expelling  him  from 
their  lands,  burning  his  house  that  he  may  not  return,  would  then  find 
themselves  compelled  to  offer  him  inducements  to  remain.  Agriculture 
would  then  improve  and  wages  would  rise,  and  the  power  to  consume  cot- 
ton, on  both  sides  of  the  Atlantic,  would  grow,  to  the  infinite  advantage  of 
the  planter.  With  the  increased  demand,  he  would  at  length  find  some- 
thing like  certainty  in  place  of  the  present  gambling  system  under  which 
he  is  so  often  nearly  ruined.  How  little  certainty  he  now  can  have,  will  be 
seen  by  the  following  diagrams,  which  I  take  from  the  circular  of  Messrs. 
Rathbone,  Brothers,  &  Co.,  before  referred  to. 

Fluctuations  in  the  price  of  Cotton,  in  1848. 

Jan.       Feb.      Mar.      April.     May.  June.    July.      Aug.     Sept.        Oct.       NOT.     Dec. 


3d. 


*  Fair  Orleans.  f  Middling.  $  Ordinary. 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 


The  following  shows  ihe  variations,  from  1844  to  1848,  in  the  prices  of 
cotton,  twist,  and  cloth. 


1845. 


1846. 


1847. 


1848. 


d. 

No.  40s,  11 
Best  2d  10 

Mule 

Twist.      9 

*  Gray  8 

Shirtings,  . 
72  Reed, 

38$  Yds.  • 

Cotton      6 
Fair 
Upland. 


The  highest  and  lowest  lines  show  the  comparative  prices  of  yarn  and  cotton,  the  quotations  beinj 
per.  Ib.  on  the  left  of  the  tables.  The  middle  line  shows  the  fluctuations  of  a  cotton  long  cloth,  thi 
quotations  being  per  piece,  on  the  right  of  the  tables. 


Here  we  see  the  price  of  cotton  lowest  when  cloth  is  at  the  highest;  and 
the  manufacturers  realizing  fortunes,  while  the  planter  is  being  ruined.  Such 
are  the  inevitable  results  of  a  system  that  forces  almost  all  the  cotton  of  the 
world  into  a  market  in  which  there  is  but  a  given  amount  to  be  exchanged 
against  it,  and  in  which  the  price  of  each  pound  is  dependent  entirely  upon 
the  relation  which  the  whole  mass  bears  to  the  constantly  diminishing  sum 
that  can  be  spared  to  pay  for  it.  It  is  a  constantly  shrinking  Procrustean 
bed.  While  thus  destroying  the  planter,  and  lessening  his  power  to  provide 
for  his  people,  there  is  an  unceasing  abuse  of  him  as  an  owner  of  slaves, 
and  an  unceasing  threat  to  substitute  the  free  labour  of  the  wretched  Hin- 
doo for  that  of  the  well-fed,  well-clothed,  and  well-housed  labourer  of  the 
South,  and  the  lower  the  price  of  cotton,  the  stronger  is  the  determination  to 
keep  it  low.  Railroads  are  to  be  made  in  India,  that  cotton  may  come  to 
market  cheaply,  and  cotton  cloth  go  more  freely  to  that  country  ;  and  yet  with 
every  step  of  increase  in  the  export  of  cotton  goods,  the  poor  Hindoo  becomes 
more  and  more  enslaved,  and  more  and  more  the  victim  of  famine  and  pes- 
tilence. 

The  difference  between  twelve  cents  and  eight  cents  per  pound  for  cotton 
is,  f.n  an  average,  about  one  cent  a  yard.  The  consumption  of  Great  Britain 
and  Ireland  is  about  fifteen  yards  per  head,  while  the  average  of  that  of  her 
colonies  is  about  three.  It  is  absurd  to  suppose  that  this  difference  could 
make  any  essential  difference  in  the  consumption  of  an  article  of  the  first 
importance,  under  natural  circumstances;  but  if  it  could,  how  immense 
would  be  the  difference  in  our  home  consumption  that  would  result  from 
the  adoption  of  a  system  that  would  enable  the  farmers  of  Tennessee  and 
Ohio  to  exchange  produce  with  the  planter — food  for  cotton — giving  acre  for 
acre,  instead  of,  as  now,  bushels  for  pounds — the  difference  being  swallowed 
up  in  the  transit  of  the  food  and  the  cotton  to  and  from  Liverpool  and  Man- 
chester. 

The  harmony  of  interests,  throughout  every  part  of  the  Union,  is  perfect, 
and  all  that  is  needed  is,  that  all  should  understand  it.  What  injures  the 
farmer  injures  the  planter;  and  vice  versa,  the  planter  cannot  suffer  without 
injury  to  the  farmer.  Throughout  the  South,  planters  are  abandoning  cotton 
and  substituting  wheat,  and  that  at  a  moment  when  the  European  market 


118  THE    HARMONY    OF   INTERESTS. 

for  food  is  to  be  closed  against  the  hundreds  of  millions  for  which,  as  it  i$ 
asserted,  we  now  need  a  market. 

As  some  may  doubt  the  existence  of  this  harmony,  I  propose  now  to  show 
how  the  present  course  of  action,  as  relates  to  food,  tends  to  destroy  the 
market  for  cotton. 

The  people  of  Germany  and  Russia,  after  feeding  themselves,  have  food 
to  sell.  With  the  produce  of  that  food  they  desire  to  buy  cloth.  The 
higher  the  price  of  the  food  they  sell,  the  more  cloth  they  can  buy.  The 
great  food  market,  at  present,  is  England.  If  we  fill  that  market,  the  price 
of  food  will  be  low,  and  the  German  can  buy  little  cotton.  If  we  do  not, 
it  may  be  high,  and  he  may  buy  much  cotton.  We  are  now  converting 
labourers,  miners,  and  mechanics  into  farmers,  diminishing  the  consumers 
and  increasing  the  producers.  The  more  consumers  we  have,  the  less 
food  we  shall  have  to  spare,  the  higher  will  be  the  price  of  food  in 
England,  and  the  greater  will  be  the  quantity  of  cotton  that  can  be  purchased 
by  the  German  and  the  Russian.  The  more  producers  we  have,  the  more 
food  we  shall  have  to  sell,  the  lower  will  be  its  price,  and  the  smaller  will 
be  the  quantity  of  cotton  that  can  be  produced  by  the  German  and  the 
Russian.  All  this  seems  to  me  so  obviously  true,  that  it  needs  only  to  be 
stated.  It  has  been  seen  that  the  price  of  food  is  here  maintained  by  a  home 
demand  resulting  from  the  great  immigration  now  taking  place,  and  we 
know  that  if  by  causing  a  demand  for  labour  for  the  building  of  furnaces 
and  mills,  and  other  similar  works,  we  could  cause  the  immigration  to  go 
next  year  to  half  a  million,  there  would  be  a  further  demand  for  grain,  that 
would  carry  prices  to  a  point  still  higher.  Let  us  now  suppose  the  immi- 
gration of  next  year  to  be  600,000,  producing  a  further  increase  of  demand  for 
food  to  the  extent  of  twenty  or  thirty  millions  of  dollars,  and  see  what  would 
be  the  effect  upon  the  planter.  The  Canadian  would  find  a  market  for  his 
grain  within  the  Union,  for  the  price  would  be  sufficiently  high  to  enable 
him  to  pay  the  duty.  The  value  of  agricultural  labour  everywhere  would 
rise  with  the  increasing  price  of  food  ;  and  every  farmer,  at  home  and 
abroad,  would  consume  more  cloth,  because  he  could  sell  the  products  of 
his  labour  higher,  t.  e.  he  could  obtain  more  cloth  and  iron  for  it.  The 
German,  the  Russian,  the  Irishman  and  the  Englishman  would  be  larger 
customers  than  now,  while  the  home  demand  would  absorb  enormous  quan- 
tities that  would  otherwise  go  to  EnglanJ  to  augment  "  the  stock  on  hand," 
by  the  size  of  which  is  measured  the  price  to  be  paid  for  the  ensuing  crop. 

Our  present  policy  tends  to  destroy  the  home  market  and  the  foreign 
market  too.  It  diminishes  the  productiveness  of  labour  on  both  sides  of  the" 
Atlantic,  and  all  that  is  taken  from  the.  surplus  that  remains  after  feeding 
the  labourer,  is  so  much  taken  from  the  fund  that  would  otherwise  go  to  the 
purchase  of  cloth  or  iron. 

THE  TOBACCO  PLANTER. 

A  brief  examination  of  the  tobacco  trade  will  show  precisely  similar  re- 
sults. In  1822,  we  exported  83,000  hogsheads,  and  the  price  was  $74  82, 
yielding  about  86,200,000.  In  1845,  we  exported  147,000  hogsheads,  and 
the  price  was  $50,  yielding  $7,350,000.  Deducting  the  extra  expense 
of  transportation  to  the  place  of  shipment,  the  producers  received  less  for 
the  large  quantity  than  they  had  done  for  the  small  one.  From  1830  to 
1835,  the  export  averaged  90,000,  and  the  amount  was  $6,200,000,  yielding 
to  the  producer,  on  his  plantation,  as  much  as  the  larger  quantity  in  1845. 
The  sum  of  $6,200,000,  at  these  two  periods,  would  have  brought  in  Liver- 
pool >— 


THE    HARMONY   OF    INTERESTS.  119 


1830  to  1835,  pieces  of  cloth,  3,300,000,  or  tons  of  iron,  200,000 
1845,  "  "      3,000,000  "          130,000 

The  planter  is  giving  almost  two-thirds  more  of  tobacco  for  twenty  per  cent, 
more  cloth,  although  his  brother  planter  is  almost  ruined  by  the  low  price 
of  cotton ;  but  in  the  case  of  iron  it  is  worse,  for  he  gives  two-thirds  more 
for  thirty-five  per  cent.  leas.  In  the  first  period,  he  could  have  two  and  one- 
fifth  tons  for  a  hogshead;  whereas  in  the  last  he  has  little  more  than  one- 
third  of  the  quantity,  or  seven-eighths  of  a  ton.  tt  is  obvious  that  he  is  being 
taxed  by  somebody,  that  he  is  giving  more  and  receiving  less,  and  that  the 
cause  of  this  is,  that  the  productive  power  enabling  the  people  outside  of  the 
Union  to  pay  for  tobacco,  does  not  keep  pace  with  the  power  of  those  inside 
of  the  Union  to  produce  it.  What  is  his  remedy  ?  It  is  to  increase  the  number 
of  people  inside  of  the  Union,  with  whom  he  can  have  perfect  freedom  of 
trade.  The  Englishman  will  consume  six  pounds  for  one  that  he  can  now 
consume,  burdened  as  it  is  with  a  tax  of  3s.  per  pound ;  the  German  will 
do  the  same;  and  so  will  the  Frenchman,  when  he  can  free  himself  from 
the  tax  imposed  upon  him  by  the.  government  monopoly.  The  more  men 
that  are  imported,  the  more  will  be  transferred  from  the  list  of  small  cus- 
tomers to  that  of  large  ones,  and  the  less  will  be  the  cost  of  transportation 
from  the  place  of  production  in  Maryland  or  Virginia,  Ohio  or  Kentucky, 
to  the  place  of  consumption,  Philadelphia  or  New  York,  Berlin  or  Vienna ; 
for  the  larger  the  bulk  and  value  of  the  commodities  transported  west,  the 
lower  will  be  the  charge  for  transportation  eastward.  Between  the  interests 
of  the  tobacco  planter,  the  manufacturer,  and  the  ship-owner,  there  is  there- 
fore perfect  harmony. 

THE    SUGAR   PLANTER. 

The  sugar  trade  presents  the  same  state  of  things.  The  agriculturists  of 
the  world  are  giving  a  constantly  increasing  quantity  of  labour  as  the  equiva- 
lent of  a  constantly  diminishing  one.  The  following  exhibit  of  the  move- 
ment of  the  great  sugar  market,  since  the  commencement  of  the  present 
century,  shows  that  the  amount  paid  for  sugar  has  been  constantly  dimin- 
ishing, while  the  price  of  the  English  commodities  given  in  exchange  has 
varied  in  a  degree  so  much  less  that  whereas  in  1801  the  consumption  of  14^ 
persons  paid  for  a  ton  of  iron,  that  of  24  was  required  in  1831,  and  the  pro- 
portion has  been  steadily  increasing.  The  whole  sum  paid  in  1847  for  this 
important  article  of  food,  by  twenty-nine  millions  of  people,  was  less  than 
was  paid  in  1801  by  sixteen  millions,  and  the  contribution  per  head  was 
less  than  one-half,  and  yet  the  difference  in  the  price  of  iron  was,  by  com- 
parison, trifling.* 

*  The  case  is  the  same  in  regard  to  all  other  of  the  products  of  the  land.  In  1841  and 
1842,  the  colonial  timber  received  in  Great  Britain  averaged  931,000  loads.  In  1846 
and  1847,  the  average  was  1,150,000  loads.  In  1848,  1,102,000  loads.  The  price, 
meanwhile,  had,  however,  fallen  almost  ten  per  cent.,^  and  the  colonist,  aAer  paying  the 
extra  freight,  must  have  received  less,  in  money,  for  the  large  than  for  the  small  quan- 
tity, while  the  price  of  iron  had  advanced  fifty  per  cent  His  timber  would  therefore 
yield  him  about  forty  per  cent,  less  weight  of  iron  to  be  employed  in  the  further  pro- 
duction of  timber.  The  writer  from  whom  I  quote  gives  many  other  facts  to  show  that 
the  increased  supplies  have  been  obtained  at  "  the  same  cost  of  labour,"  or  that  means 
have  been  found  "  for  making  our  [their]  own  industry  more  productive.''^  It  does  not 
matter  which,  but  of  the  two  conditions  he  "prefers  the  former."  The  former  is  the  one, 
and  being  such  it  is  scarcely  to  be  wondered  that  the  poor  and  over-taxed  colonists  deaira 
annexation. 

f  Edinburgh  Review,  July,  1849. 


120  THE    HARMONY    OF   INTERESTS. 

Number  of  per- 
i', i,:.  fid  with 
lugar  in  u- 

Quantity  retained  tor     Price  per  Total  value  change  for  a 

Population.          consumption.— cwtn.        cwt.  consumed.        Price  per  head.  Price  of  iron,    tun  of  iron. 

1801    16,338,000    3,639,000*    45/t   £8.188,000    10/2     £7  6J      14-2 
1811    18,500,000    3,818,000*    4 l/6t  £7,888,000      8/6     £8{          18-8 
1&21  21,200,000    3,529,000*    34/t   £6,000,000      5/8      £6  10f    23 
1831   24,029,000    4,233,000     23/8t  £5,000,000.     4/2      £5|          24 

I  do  not  extend  this  table,  for  Mr.  Tooke's  list  of  prices  does  not  come 
down  to  the  end  of  the  next  decennial  period,  and  I  have  no  other  that  ap- 
pears to  correspond  with  it.  Enough,  however,  is  given  to  show  that  the 
people  of  the  United  Kingdom  were  steadily  giving  less  iron  for  more  sugar. 
In  1801  the  planter  could  have  1,100,000  tons  as  the  equivalent  of  180,000 
tons;  but  in  1831  he  could  have  but  a  million  of  tons  as  the  equivalent  of 
210,000.  From  that  time  to  the  present  there  has  been  an  unceasing  ef- 
fort to  cheapen  sugar,  and  yet  there  were  taken  for  consumption  (including 
the  large  quantity  exported  after  being  refined)  in  the  years  1845  to  1847, 
only  1 5,900,000  cwts.,  or  an  average  of  5,300,000,  being  only  45  per  cent, 
more  than  in  1801,  while  the  population  had  increased  90  per  cent.  It  is 
obvious  that  the  power  of  consumption  diminishes,  and  yet  the  prices  of  the 
world  are  fixed  in  England.  The  consequence  of  this  is  seen  in  the  fact 
that  5,800,000  tons, in  1 847,  would  command  but  £7,200,000,  while  3,600,000 
in  1801  would  command  about  £8,200,000. 

The  return  to  labour  employed  in  the  cultivation  of  cotton  has  fallen  so 
iow  that  the  Carolinian  tries  wheat,  and  the  Mississippian  sugar.  Sugar 
falls  so  low  that  the  West  Indian  turns  his  attention  to  coffee.  By  the  time 
his  trees  have  become  productive,  the  price  has  so  far  fallen  that  he  cuts 
them  down,  and  then  the  price  rises,  while  that  of  sugar  falls. §  Thus  is  it 
ever  and  everywhere.  The  producers  are  over-ridden  by  the  exchangers, 
and  so  must  they  continue  to  be  while  they  shall  continue  to  have  the  price 
of  their  whole  crops  determined  by  that  which  can  be  obtained  for  a  small 
surplus  in  the  constantly  diminishing  market  of  England. 

The  production  of  sugar  does  not  vary  greatly  from  a  million  of  tons,  and 
the  yield  to  the  planter  may  be  about  $70,  the  whole  amount  being  about 
$70,000,000.  Taking  the  cotton  crop  at  $80,000,000,  we  have  the  sum  of 
$150,000,000  as  the  value  of  the  labour  of  that  large  portion  of  the  popula- 
tion of  the  world  employed  in  producing  these  two  articles,  so  essential  to 
the  comfort  of  the  rest  of  the  world.  The  equivalent  of  this  sum  in  1845 
and  1846  might  have  been  (delivered  on  the  plantation)  about  2,500,000 
tons  of  iron,  the  article  that,  of  all  others,  is  most  essential  to  the  mainte- 
nance, or  the  increase,  of  the  productive  power. 

A  ton  of  bar  iron  is  not  the  equivalent  of  twenty-five  days'  labour,  pro- 
perly'em  ployed  among  the  coal  and  iron  fields  of  the  Union,  but  even  at 
that  rate,  one  man  would  give  more  than  twelve  tons  per  annum.  To  pro- 
duce the  whole  quantity  required  to  pay  for  the  cotton  and  sugar  crops  of 
the  world  would  require,  then,  the  labour  of  200,000  men.  Is  it  not  obvious 
that  the  agriculturists  of  the  world  are  taxed  to  a  vast  amount  for  the  support 

•  Porter's  Progress  of  the  Nation,  Vol.  III.  page  32. 

f  Tooke's  History  of  Prices,  Vol.  II.  page  413.  Mr.  Tooke  gives  the  various  prices  of 
the  year.  I  have  taken  what  appears  to  me  to  be  the  average. 

*  Ibid.  p.  406. 

§From  this  cause  it  is  that  coffee  is  now  scarce  and  high,  and  sugar  abundant  and 
cheap,  the  price  of  the  latter  in  London  being  but  about  24».  How  much  is  leA  for  the 
poor  producer  that  has  paid  freight  from  Benares,  far  up  the  Ganges,  and  all  the  charges 
of  all  the  persons  through  whose  hands  it  has  passed,  may  readily  be  imagined.  Twenty 
pounds  of  sugar  must  be  required  to  pay  for  one  of  cotton,  in  the  form  of  coarse  cloth, 


THE  HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  121 

of  the  fleets  and  armies,  the  merchants  and  brokers,  the  paupers  and  the 
noblemen  of  Great  Britain,  and  is  it  not  incumbent  upon  them  to  free  them- 
selves from  such  a  state  of  vassalage  ?  To  add  to  the  present  annual  pro- 
duction of  the  Union  in  the  next  seven  years,  the  whole  quantity  of  iron 
required  to  pay  for  the  cotton  and  sugar  crops  of  the  world  would  require 
not  the  slightest  effort,  and  so  far  would  it  be  from  diminishing  the  supply 
of  food,  or  cotton,  that  the  production  of  both  would  increase  at  a  rate  more 
rapid  lhan  was  ever  before  known,  for  the  farmer  and  the  planter  would 
thus  obtain  a  market  on  the  land  for  the  products  of  the  land,  and  good  roads 
to  go  to  distant  markets,  and  the  chief  part  of  the  time  and  labour  now 
wasted  in  the  work  of  transportation  might  be  given  to  the  work  of  cultiva- 
tion. We  should  then  import  hundreds  of  thousands  of  men  to  make  roads 
through  the  States  already  organized,  instead  of  exporting  hundreds  of 
thousands  to  California,  and  then  squandering  our  resources  in  the  prema- 
ture effort  to  make  a  road  by  which  to  communicate  with  them. 

It  is  time  for  the  cotton  planter  to  look  this  question  fully  in  the  face. 
Had  he  a  market,  he  could  in  a  brief  period  increase  the  crop  to  5,000,000 
of  bales.     Having  no  market,  he  is  compelled  to  limit  the  cultivation,  and 
thus  it  is  that  the  product  of  such  a  region  as  South  Alabama  does  not  in- 
crease.    In  1839  it  yielded,  bales,        .         .         .         .         .         551,000 
From  1845  to  the  present  time  the  average  has  been  only          440.000* 
The  people  who  should  be  raising  cotton,  or  making  iron,  are  perpetually 
on  the  move,  producing  nothing.     The  picture  presented  in  the  following 
paragraph,  taken  from  one  of  the  papers  of  the  day,  is  the  one  that  meets 
our  eyes  look  where  we  may  : — 

"The  tide  of  emigration  continues  to  pour  through  our  city  southward  and  westward 
with  increasing  volume.  The  rush  is  tremendous.  Throughout  the  day,  from  early  dawn 
until  late  at  night,  long  trains  of  wagons,  families,  and  forces  are  seen  moving  through 
our  streets.  Both  our  ferries  are  kept  in  continual  operation.  Mr.  Fairhurst,  one  of  the 
proprietors  of  the  lower  ferry,  has  kept  a  memorandum  of  the  movers  crossing  at  that 
point  during  the  last  two  weeks.  In  that  time  three  hundred  and  fifteen  wagons  have  crossed 
the  river,  of  which  number  214  were  bound  for  Texas,  89  for  the  southern  counties  of 
our  own  State,  and  12  for  Louisiana.  It  is  estimated  that,  counting  whites  and  blacks, 
there  are  about  five  persons  to  each  wagon.  This  would  show  that  within  the  last  four- 
teen days  about  fifteen  hundred  movers  have  passed  this  one  ferry.  We  have  no  record 
of  the  number  crossing  at  the  upper  ferry,  but  if  it  is  as  large  as  the  lower,  the  number 
of  movers  passing  through  our  city  during  the  present  month  will  be  about  six  thousand.'" 
— Little  Rock  Arkansas')  Democrat,  Nov.  16. 

Those  men  are  flying  from  the  rich  and  unoccupied  soils  of  lower  Caro- 
lina and  South  Alabama  to  the  high  lands  of  Arkansas  and  Texas,  thus  in- 
creasing their  necessity  for  transportation,  and  diminishing  their  power  to 
obtain  it.  Let  them  fly  as  they  may,  they  cannot  fly  so  fast  as  to  prevent 
the  increase  of  the  cotton  crop,  the  average  of  which  must  soon  stand  at 
3,000,000  of  bales ;  but  where  then  shall  the  planter  find  a  market  ?  Among 
the  sugar  planters  of  the  world  ?  Like  himself,  they  are  ruined  for  want 
of  a  market.  Among  the  coffee  growers?  Like  himself,  they  are  ruined 
for  want  of  a  market.  Among  the  wheat  growers  ?  The  Russian  wastes 
his  crop  for  want  of  a  market,  and  the  American  is  competing  with  him  for 
the  possession  of  that  of  England,  while  the  Englishman  is  ruined  by  com- 
petition with  both.t  Is  it  among  the  operatives  of  England  ?  They  are 

•  De  Bow's  Commercial  Review,  Vol.  VII.  page  446. 

fThe  following  passage  from  one  of  the  journals  of  the  day,  presents  a  tolerably  cor- 
rect view  of  the  course  of  things  in  Great  Britain.  The  producers  are  being  ruined,  and 
all  are  becoming  consumers,  and  thus  it  is  that  Ireland,  exclusively  agricultural,  furnishes 
•  market  for  food.  It  is  forgotten,  however,  that  every  diminution  in  the  amount  of  pro- 


122  THE    HARMONY   OF    INTERESTS. 

endeavouring  to  underwork  the  Hindoo,  and  their  power  to  purchase  cotton 
or  sugar  diminishes  daily.  They  need  a  market  for  their  labour.  Is  it  in 
France?  France  is  always  at  war,  and  produces  little.  Her  consumption 
of  American  cotton  in  1842  and  1843  was  717,000  bales.  In  1846  and 
1847,  only  575,000.* 

Look  where  he  may,  he  must  see  that  the  producers  of  the  world  want 
markets,  and  that  for  want  of  them  they  are  becoming  poorer  instead  of 
richer,  and  that  their  power  to  obtain  even  the  machinery  of  production  is 
daily  diminishing,  the  price  of  iron  in  sugar,  coffee,  cotton,  wheat,  indigo,  or 
any  other  of  the  products  of  the  earth,  tending  steadily  upward,  and  yet 
there  is  no  single  commodity  in  the  world  that  would  tend  to  fall  so  steadily, 
but  for  the  existence  of  the  monopoly  system.  The  supply  might  be  in- 
creased to  an  indefinite  amount,  and  witn  a  rapidity  far  exceeding  that  of 
any  otherof  the  products  of  the  earth.  Make  a  market  for  it  requiring  annually 
10,000,000  of  tons,  and  this  country  could  supply  it  in  ten  years.  Double 
or  treble  it,  and  we  could  supply  the  whole  in  reasonable  time,  for  our  ca- 
pacity is  without  limit,  and  we  could  command  the  services  of  half  the 
kbourers  of  Europe.  Here  it  is,  and  here  alone,  that  the  planter  can  look 
for  a  market  capable  of  expanding  itself  in  the  ratio  of  the  increase  in  his 
power  to  furnish  supplies.  Here,  and  here  alone,  can  the  market  for  coffee, 
silk,  indigo,  and  all  other  of  the  products  of  the  world  be  so  far  enlarged  as 
to  enable  the  coffee  planter,  and  the  cultivator  of  silk  and  indigo  to  quadruple 
their  consumption  of  cotton. 

CHAPTER  ELEVENTH. 

HOW  PROTECTION  AFFECTS  THE  LANDOWNER. 

THE  great  saving  fund  is  the  land,  and  it  is  by  the  almost  insensible 
contribution  of  labour  that  it  acquires  value.  The  first  object  of  the  poor 
cultivator  of  the  thin  soils  is  to  obtain  food  and  clothing  for  himself  and  his 
family.  His  leisure  is  given  to  the  work  of  improvement.  At  one  place 
he  cuts  a  little  drain,  and  at  another  he  roots  out  a  stump.  At  one  moment 
he  cuts  fuel  for  his  family,  and  thus  clears  his  land,  and  at  another  digs 

duction  diminishes  the  amount  of  commodities  that  can  be  given  as  the  equivalent  of  the 
products  of  others,  and  that  those  who  buy  food  have  little  to  give  for  clothing,  and  must 
go  in  rags: — 

«  The  prospect  of  an  Irish  demand  for  corn  is  improving,  and  also  that  the  dependence 
of  England,  on  foreign  supplies,  will  gradually  increase.  The  land  monopoly  of  England, 
by  adding  the  item  of  rent  to  be  paid  by  the  occupier  and  producer,  made  requisite  a  tax 
on  the  foreign  article,  which  should  protect  him  against  the  proprietary  producers  abroad, 
who  had  no  rent  to  pay.  The  removal  of  this  tax  has  now  thrown  directly  upon  the 
English  farmer  the  whole  burden  of  his  rent,  which  was  be-fore  borne  by  all  consumers 
of  bread.  This  burden  will  be  enhanced,  by  the  abrogation  of  the  navigation  laws, 
which,  by  diminishing  freights,  will  make  the  competition  between  the  cheap  rentless 
lands  of  other  countries,  and  the  landlord-burdened  soil  of  England,  more  severe,  and,  as 
a  consequence,  much  of  the  poorer  soils  will  be  abandoned,  while  the  expensive  system 
of  culture  before  resorted  to,  to  increase  the  quantity  of  protected  corn,  must  be  relin- 
quished as  unprofitable.  A  considerable  diminution  in  the  product  of  a  good  English 
harvest,  as  compared  with  former  years,  may  then  freely  be  looked  for.  We  have  given 
above  an  official  table  of  the  quantity  of  food  taken  for  consumption  in  England,  for  the 
year  ending  August,  1849.  That  was  in  aid  of  the  harvest  of  1848,  which  was  "good," 
but  the  acreable  product,  from  causes  alluded,  could  not  have  been  as  large  as  usual. 
The  result  of  this  is,  that  the  small  farmers,  with  small  crops  at  low  prices,  cannot  meet 
tithes,  taxes,  poor  rates,  and  rent,  the  last  the  most  onerous ;  and  their  capital  and  num- 
bers are  annually  diminishing,  swelling  the  numbers  of  bread-consumers  in  other  em- 
ployments." 

•  Merchants'  Magazine,  Vol.  XVII.  pa«[e  '£2 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  123 

a  well  to  facilitate  the  watering  of  his  cattle,  and  thus  keep  his  manure  in 
the  stable-yard.  He  knows  that  the  machine  will  feed  him  better  the  more 
perfectly  he  fashions  it,  and  that  there  is  always  place  for  his  time  and  his 
labour  to  be  expended  with  advantage  to  himself. 

The  land  was  given  to  man  for  his  use,  and  the  basis  of  the  whole  science 
of  political  economy  is  to  be  found  in  the  Jaw  which  governs  his  relation 
with  this  great  and  only  machine  of  production.  Mr.  Ricardo  taught  that 
in  the  infancy  of  society  men  could  command  rich  soils,  from  which  they 
could  obtain  an  abundant  supply  of  food  ;  but  that  with  the  growth  of  popu- 
lation food  became  more  scarce,  producing  a  necessity  for  dispersion  in 
quest  of  those  rich  soils.  The  common  sense  of  mankind  teaches  the 
contrary,  and  in  this  case,  as  in  all  others,  the  common  sense  of  the  many 
is  right,  while  the  uncommon  sense  of  the  few  is  wrong,  as  will  be  seen  by 
all  who  will  take  the  trouble  to  follow  out  the  following  sketch*  of  the 
gradual  occupation  of  the  earth: — 

"  The  first  cultivator  commences  his  operations  on  the  hill-side.  Below 
him  are  lands  upon  which  have  been  carried,  by  force  of  water,  the  richer 
portions  of  those  above,  as  well  as  the  leaves  of  trees,  and  the  fallen  trees 
themselves ;  all  of  which  have  there,  from  time  immemorial,  rotted  and 
become  incorporated  with  the  earth,  and  thus  have  been  produced  soils 
fitted  to  yield  the  largest  returns  to  labour:  yet  for  this  reason  are  they 
inaccessible.  Their  character  exhibits 'itself  in  the  enormous  trees  with 
which  they  are  covered,  and  in  their  power  of  retaining  the.  water  necessary 
to  aid  the  process  of  decomposition ;  but  the  poor  settler  wants  the  power 
either  to  clear  them  of  their  timber,  or  to  drain  them  of  the  superfluous 
moisture.  He  begins  on  the  hill-side,  but  at  the  next  step  we  find  him 
descending  the  hill,  and  obtaining  larger  returns  to  labour.  He  has  more 
food  for  himself,  and  he  has  now  the  means  of  feeding  a  horse  or  an  ox. 
Aided  by  the  manure  that  is  thus  yielded  to  him  by  the  better  lands,  we  see 
him  next  retracing  his  steps,  improving  the  hill-side,  and  compelling  it  to 
yield  a  return  double  that  which  he  at  first  obtained.  With  each  step  down 
the  hill  he  obtains  still  larger  reward  for  his  labour,  and  at  each  he  returns, 
with  increased  power,  to  the  cultivation  of  the  original  poor  soil.  He  has 
now  horses  and  oxen,  and  while  by  their  aid  he  extracts  from  the  new  soils 
the  manure  that  had  accumulated  for  ages,  he  has  also  carts  and  wagons  to 
carry  it  up  the  hill:  and  at  each  step  his  reward  is  increased,  while  his 
labours  are  lessened.  He  goes  back  to  the  sand  and  raises  the  marl,  with 
which  he  covers  the  surface;  or  he  returns  to  the  clay  and  sinks  into  the 
limestone,  by  aid  of  which  he  doubles  its  product.  He  is  all  the  time  mak- 
ing a  machine  which  feeds  him  while  he  makes  it,  and  which  increases  in 
its  powers  the  more  he  takes  from  it.  At  first  it  was  worthless.  It  has 
fed  and  clothed  him  for  years,  and  now  it  has  a  large  value,  and  those  who 
might  desire  to  use  it  would  pay  him  a  large  rent. 

"  The  earth  is  a  great  machine,  given  to  man  to  be  fashioned  to  his  pur- 
pose. The  more  he  fashions  it  the  better  it  feeds  him,  because  each  step 
is  but  preparatory  to  a  new  one  more  productive  than  the  last;  requiring 
less  labour  and  yielding  larger  return.  The  labour  of  clearing  is  great,  yet 
the  return  is  small.  The  earth  is  covered  with  stumps,  and  filled  with  roots. 
With  each  year  the  roots  decay  and  the  ground  becomes  enriched,  while 
the  labour  of  ploughing  is  diminished.  At  length  the  stumps  disappear, 
and  the  return  is  doubled;  while  the  labour  is  less  by  one-half  than  at  first. 
To  forward  this  process  the  owner  has  done  nothing  but  crop  the  ground; 
nature  having  done  the  rest.  The  aid  he  thus  obtains  from  her  yields  him 

•  Originally  published  in  my  book.  «  The  Past,  the  Present,  and  the  Future." 


124  THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 

as  much  food  as  in  the  outset  was  obtained  by  the  labour  of  felling  and  de- 
stroying the.  trees.  This,  however,  is  not  all.  The  surplus  thus  yielded 
has  given  him  means  for  improving  the  poorer  lands  by  furnishing  manure 
with  which  to  enrich  them,  and  thus  he  has  trebled  his  original  return 
without  farther  labour ;  for  that  which  he  saves  in  working  the  new  soils 
suffices  to  carry  the  manure  to  the  old  ones.  He  is  obtaining  a  daily  in- 
creased power  over  the  various  treasures  of  the  earth. 

"With  every  operation  connected  with  the  fashioning  of  the  earth,  the 
result  is  the  same.  The  first  step  is,  invariably,  the  most  costly  one,  and 
the  least  productive.  The  first  drain  commences  near  the  stream,  where 
the  febour  is  heaviest.  It  frees  from  water  but  a  few  acres.  A  little  higher, 
the  same  quantity  of  labour,  profiting  by  what  has  been  already  done,  frees 
twice  the  number.  Again  the  number  is  doubled,  and  now  the  most  perfect 
system  of  thorough  drainage  may  be  established  with  less  labour  than  was 
at  first  required  for  one  of  the  most  imperfect  kind.  To  bring  the  lime 
into  connection  with  the  clay,  upon  fifty  acres,  is  lighter  labour  than  was  the 
clearing  of  a  single  one,  yet  the  process  doubles  the  return  for  each  acre  of 
the  fifty.  The  man  who  wants  a  little  fuel  for  his  own  use,  expends  much 
labour  in  opening  the  neighbouring  vein  of  coal.  To  enlarge  this,  so  as 
to  double  the  product,  is  a  work  of  comparatively  small  labour;  as  is  the 
next  enlargement,  by  which  he  is  enabled  to  use  a  drift  wagon,  giving  him 
a  return  fifty  times  greater  than  was  obtained  when  he  used  only  his  arms, 
or  a  wheelbarrow.  To  sink  a  shaft  to  the  first  vein  below  the  surface,  and 
erect  a  steam-engine, are  expensive  operations;  but  these  once  accomplished 
every  future  step  becomes  more  productive,  while  less  costly.  To  sink  to 
the  next  vein  below  and  to  tunnel  to  another,  are  trifles  in  comparison  with 
the  first,  yet  each  furnishes  a  return  equally  large.  The  first  line  of  raiJ- 
road  runs  by  houses  and  towns  occupied  by  one  or  two  hundred  thousand 
persons.  Half  a  dozen  little  branches,  costing  together  far  less  labour  than 
the  first,  bring  into  connexion  with  it  three  hundred  thousand,  or  perhaps 
half  a  million.  The  trade  increases,  and  a  second  track,  a  third,  or  a  fourth, 
may  be  required.  The  original  one  facilitates  the  passage  of  the  materials 
and  the  removal  of  obstructions,  and  three  new  ones  may  now  be  made  with 
less  labour  than  was  required  for  the  first. 

"All  labour  thus  expended  in  fashioning  the  great  machine,  is  but  the 
prelude  to  the  application  of  further  labour  with  still  increased  returns. 
With  each  such  application  wages  rise,  and  hence  it  is  that  portions  of  the 
machine,  as  it  exists,  invariably  exchange,  when  brought  to  market,  for  far 
less  labour  than  they  have  cost.  The.  man  who  cultivated  the  thin  soils 
was  happy  to  obtain  a  hundred  bushels  for  his  year's  work.  With  the  pro- 
gress of  himself  and  his  neighbour  down  the  hill  into  the  more  fertile  soils, 
wages  have  risen,  and  two  hundred  bushels  are  now  required.  His  farm 
will  yield  a  thousand  bushels;  but  it  requires  the  labour  of  four  men,  who 
must  have  two  hundred  bushels  each,  and  the  surplus  is  but  two  hundred 
bushels.  At  twenty  years'  purchase  this  gives  a  capital  of  four  thousand 
bushels,  or  the  equivalent  of  twenty  years'  wages;  whereas  it  has  cost,  in 
the  labour  of  himself,  his  sons,  and  his  assistants,  the  equivalent  of  a  hun- 
dred years  of  labour,  or  peihaps  far  more.  During  all  this  time,  however, 
it  has  fed  and  clothed  them  all,  and  the  farm  has  been  produced  by  the 
insensible  contributions  mad>j  from  year  to  year,  unthought  of  and  unfelt. 

"  It  is  now  worth  twenty  years'  wages,  because  its  owner  has  for  years 
Liken  from  it  a  thousand  bushels  annually;  but  when  it  had  lain  for  cen- 
turies accumulating  wealth,  it  was  worth  nothing.  Such  is  the  case  with 
the  earth  everywhere.  The  more  that  is  taken  from  it,  the  more  there  is 
left.  "When  the  coal  mines  of  England  were  untouched,  they  were  valueless. 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  125 

Now  their  value  is  almost  countless;  yet  the  land  contains  abundant  sup- 
plies for  thousands  of  years.  Iron  ore,  a  century  since,  was  a  drug,  and 
leases  were  granted  at  almost  nominal  rents.  Now,  such  leases  are  deemed 
equivalent  to  the  possession  of  large  fortunes,  notwithstanding  the  great 
quantities  that  have  been  removed,  although  the  amount  of  ore  now  known 
to  exist  is  probably  fifty  times  greater  than  it  was  then. 

"The  earth  is  the  sole,  producer.  Man  fashions  and  exchanges.  A  part 
of  his  labour  is  applied  to  the  fashioning  of  the  great  machine,  and  this 
produces  changes  that  are  permanent.  The  drain,  once  cut,  remains  a 
drain;  and  the  limestone,  once  reduced  to  lime,  never  again  becomes  lime- 
stone. It  passes  into  the  food  of  man  and  animals,  and  ever  after  takes  its 
part  in  the  same  round  with  the  clay  with  which  it  has  been  incorporated. 
The  iron  rusts  and  gradually  passes  into  soil,  to  take  its  part  with  the  clay 
and  the  lime.  That  portion  of  his  labour  gives  him  wages  while  preparing 
the  machine  for  greater  future  production.  That  other  portion  which  he 
expends  on  fashioning  and  exchanging  the  products  of  the  machine,  pro- 
duces temporary  results,  and  gives  him  wages  alone.  Whatever  tends, 
therefore,  to  diminish  the  quantity  of  labour  necessary  for  the  fashioning 
and  exchanging  of  the  products,  tends  to  increase  the  quantity  that  may  be 
given  to  increasing  the  amount  of  products,  and  to  preparing  the  great 
machine  ;  and  thus,  while  increasing  the  present  return  to  labour,  preparing 
for  a  future  further  increase. 

"  The  first  poor  cultivator  obtains  a  hundred  bushels  for  his  year's  wages. 
To  pound  this  between  two  stones  requires  twenty  days  of  labour,  and  the 
work  is  not  half  done.  Had  he  a  mill  in  the  neighbourhood  he  would  have 
better  flour,  and  he  would  have  almost  his  whole  twenty  days  to  bestow 
upon  his  land.  He  pulls  up  his  grain.  Had  he  a  scythe,  he  would  havo 
more  time  for  the  preparation  of  the  machine  of  production.  He  loses  his 
axe,  and  it  requires  days  of  himself  and  his  horse  on  the  road,  to  obtain 
another.  His  machine  loses  the  time  and  the  manure,  both  of  which  would 
have  been  saved,  had  the  axe-maker  been  at  hand.  The  real  advantage 
derived  from  the  mil!  and  the  scythe,  and  from  the  proximity  of  the  axe- 
maker,  consists  simply  in  the  power  which  they  afford  him  to  devote  his 
labour  more  and  more  to  the  preparation  of  the  great  machine  of  production, 
and  such  is  the  case  with  all  the  machinery  of  preparation  and  exchange. 
The  plough  enables  hirn  to  do  as  much  in  one  day  as  with  a  spade  he  could 
do  in  five.  He  saves  four  daya  for  drainage.  The  steam-engine  drains  as 
much  as  without  it  could  be  drained  by  thousands  of  days  of  labour.  He 
has  more  leisure  to  marl  or  lime  his  land.  The  more  he  can  extract  from 
his  machine  the  greater  is  its  value,  because  every  thing  he  takes  is,  by  the 
very  act  of  taking  it,  fashioned  to  aid  further  production.  The  machine, 
therefore,  improves  by  use ;  whereas  spades,  and  ploughs,  and  steam-engines, 
and  all  other  of  the  machines  used  by  man,  are  but  the  various  forms  into 
which  he  fashions  parts  of  the  great  original  machine,  to  disappear  in  the 
act  of  being  used  ;  as  much  so  as  food,  though  not  so  rapidly.  The  earth 
is  the  great  labour  savings'  bank,  and  the  value  to  man  of  all  other  machines 
is  in  the  direct  ratio  of  their  tendency  to  aid  him  in  increasing  his  deposits 
in  the  only  bank  whose  dividends  are  perpetually  increasing,  while  its 
capital  is  perpetually  doubling.  That  it  may  continue  for  ever  so  to  do,  all 
that  it  asks  is  that  it  shall  receive  back  the  refuse  of  its  produce,  the  ma- 
nure; and  that  it  may  do  so,  the  consumer  and  the  producer  must  take  their 
places  by  each  other.  That  done,  every  change  that  is  effected  becomes 
permanent,  and  tends  to  facilitate  other  and  greater  changes.  The  whole 
business  of  the  farmer  consists  in  making  and  improving  soils,  and  the  oarth 


126  THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 

rewards  him  for  his  kindness  by  giving  him  more  and  more  food  the  more 
attention  he  bestows  upon  her. 

The  solitary  settler  has  to  occupy  the  spots  that,  with  his  rude  machinery, 
he  can  cultivate.  Having  neither  horse  nor  cart,  he  carries  home  hys  crop 
upon  his  shoulders,  as  is  now  done  in  many  parts  of  India.  He  carries  a 
hide  to  the  place  of  exchange,  distant,  perhaps,  fifty  miles,  to  obtain  for  it 
leather  or  shoes.  Population  increases,  and  roads  are  made.  More  fe/tile 
soils  are  cultivated.  The  store  and  the  mill  come  nearer  to  him,  and  he 
obtains  shoes  and  flour  with  the  use  of  less  machinery  of  exchange.  He 
has  more  leisure  for  the  preparation  of  his  great  machine,  and  the  returns 
to  labour  increase.  More  people  now  obtain  food  from  the  same  surface, 
and  new  places  of  exchange  appear.  The  wool  is,  on  the  spot,  converted 
into  cloth,  and  he  exchanges  directly  with  the  clothier.  The  saw-mill  is  at 
hand,  and  he  exchanges  with  the  sawyer.  The  tanner  gives  him  leather 
for  his  hides,  and  the  paper-maker  gives  him  paper  for  his  rags.  With 
each  of  these  changes  he  has  more  and  more  of  both  time  and  manure  to 
devote  to  the  preparation  of  the  great  food-making  machine,  and  with  each 
year  the  returns  are  larger.  His  power  to  command  the  use  of  the  ma- 
chinery of  exchange  increases,  but  his  necessity  therefor  diminishes ;  for 
with  each  year  there  is  an  increasing  tendency  towards  having  the  consumer 
placed  side  by  side  with  the  producer;  and  with  each  he  can  devote  more 
and  more  of  his  time  and  mind  to  the  business  of  fashioning  the  great  instru- 
ment ;  and  thus  the  increase  of  consuming  population  is  essential  to  the 
progress  of  production. 

"  The  loss  from  the  use  of  machinery  of  exchange  is  in  the  ratio  of  the 
bulk  of  the  article  to  be  exchanged.  Food  stands  first;  fuel,  next;  stone 
for  building,  third  ;  iron,  fourth;  cotton,  fifth;  and  so  on;  diminishing  until 
we  come  to  laces  and  nutmegs.  The  raw  material  is  that  in  the  production 
of  which  the  earth  has  most  co-operated,  and  by  the  production  of  which 
the  land  is  most  improved;  and  the  nearer  the  place  of  exchange  or  con- 
version can  be  brought  to  the  place  of  production,  the  less  is  the  loss  in  the 
process,  and  the  greater  the  power  of  accumulating  wealth  for  the  produc- 
tion of  further  wealth. 

"  The  man  who  raises  food  on  his  own  land  is  building  up  the  machine 
for  doing  so  to  more  advantage  in  the  following  year.  His  neighbour,  to 
whom  it  is  given,  on  condition  of  sitting  still,  loses  a  year's  work  on  his 
machine,  and  all  he  has  gained  is  the  pleasure  of  doing  nothing.  If  he  has 
employed  himself  and  his  horses  and  wagon  in  bringing  it  home,  the  same 
number  of  days  that  would  have  been  required  for  raising  it,  he  has  misem- 
ployed his  time,  for  his  farm  is  unimproved.  He  has  wasted  labour  and  ma- 
nure. As  nobody,  however,  gives,  it  is  obvious  that  the  man  who  has  a  farm 
and  obtains  his  food  elsewhere,  must  pay  for  raising  it,  and  pay  also  for  trans- 
porting it ;  and  that  although  he  may  have  obtained  as  good  wages  in  some 
other  pursuit,  his  farm,  instead  of  having  been  improved  by  a  year's 
cultivation,  is  worse  by  a  year's  neglect;  and  that  he  is  a  poorer  man  than 
he  would  have  been  had  he  raised  his  own  food. 

"  The  article  of  next  greatest  bulk  is  fuel.  While  warming  his  house,  he 
is  clearing  his  land.  He  would  lose  by  sitting  idle,  if  his  neighbour  brought 
his  fuel  to  him,  and  still  more  if  he  had  to  spend  the  same  time  in  hauling 
it,  because  he  would  be  wearing  out  his  wagon  and  losing  the  manure.  Were 
he  to  hire  himself  and  his  wagon  to  another  for  the  same  quantity  of  fuel 
he  could  have  cut  on  his  own  property,  he  would  be  a  loser,  for  his  farm 
would  be  uncleared. 

"  If  he  take  the  stone  from  his  own  fields  to  build  his  house,  he  gains 
doubly.  His  house  is  built,  and  his  land  is  cleared.  If  be  sit  still  and  let 


TEE    HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS.  127 

his  neighbour  bring  him  stone,  he  loses,  for  his  fields  remain  unfit  for  cul 
tivation.  If  he  work  equally  hard  for  a  neighbour,  and  receive  the  same 
apparent  wages,  he  is  a  loser  by  the  fact  that  he  has  yet  to  remove  the 
stones,  and  until  they  shall  be  removed  he  cannot  cultivate  his  land. 

"  With  every  improvement  in  the  machinery  of  exchange  there  is  a  dimi- 
nution in  the  proportion  which  that  machinery  bears  to  the  mass  of  produc- 
tion, because  of  the  extraordinary  increase  of  product  consequent  upon  the 
increased  power  of  applying  labour  to  building  up  the  great  machine.  It 
is  a  matter  of  daily  observation  that  the  demand  for  horses  and  men  increases 
as  railroads  drive  them  from  the  turnpikes,  and  the  reason  is,  that  the  farmer's 
means  of  improving  his  land  increase  more  rapidly  than  men  and  horses 
for  his  work.  The  man  who  has,  thus  far,  sent  to  market  his  half-fed  cattle, 
accompanied  by  horses  and  men  to  drive  them,  and  wagons  and  horses 
loaded  with  hay  or  turnips  with  which  to  feed  them  on  the  road,  and  to  fat- 
ten them  when  at  market ;  now  fattens  them  on  the  ground,  and  sends  them 
by  railroad  ready  for  the  slaughter-house.  His  use  of  the  machinery  of 
exchange  is  diminished  nine-tenths.  He  keeps  his  men,  his  horses  and  his 
wagons,  and  the  refuse  of  his  hay  or  turnips,  at  home.  The  former  are 
em-ployed  in  ditching  and  draining,  while  the  latter  fertilizes  the  soil  here- 
tofore cultivated.  His  production  doubles,  and  he  accumulates  rapidly, 
while  the  people  around  him  have  more  to  eat,  more  to  spend  in  clothing, 
and  accumulate  more  themselves.  He  wants  labourers  in  the  field,  and 
they  want  clothes  and  houses.  The  shoemaker  and  the  carpenter,  finding 
that  there  exists  a  demand  for  their  labour,  now  join  the  community,  eating 
the  food  on  the  ground  on  which  it  is  produced;  and  thus  the  machinery  of 
exchange  is  improved,  while  the  quantity  required  is  diminished.  The 
quantity  of  flour  consumed  on  the  spot  induces  the  miller  to  come  and  eat 
his  share,  while  preparing  that  of  others.  '  The  labour  of  exchanging  is 
diminished,  and  more  is  given  to  the  land,  and  the  lime  is  now  turned  up. 
Tons  of  turnips  are  obtained  from  the  same  surface  that  before  gave  bushels 
of  rye.  The  quantity  to  be  consumed  increases  faster  than  the  population, 
and  more  mouths  are  needed  on  the  spot,  and  next  the  woollen  mill  comes. 
The  wool  no  longer  requires  wagons  and  horses,  which  now  are  turned  to 
transporting  coal,  to  enable  the  farmer  to  dispense  with  his  woods,  and  to 
reduce  to  cultivation  the  fine  soil  that  has,  for  centuries,  produced  nothing 
but  timber.  Production  again  increases,  and  the  new  wealth  now  takes  the 
form  of  the  cotton-mill ;  and,  with  every  step  in  the  progress,  the  farmer 
finds  new  demands  on  the  great  machine  he  has  constructed,  accompanied 
with  increased  power  on  his  part  to  build  it  up  higher  and  stronger,  and  to 
sink  its  foundations  deeper.  He  now  supplies  beef  and  mutton,  wheat,  but- 
ter, eggs,  poultry,  cheese,  and  every  other  of  the  comforts  and  luxuries  of 
life,  for  which  the  climate  is  suited ;  and  from  the  same  land  which  afforded, 
when  his  father  or  grandfather  first  commenced  cultivation  on  the  light  soil 
of  the  hills,  scarcely  sufficient  rye  or  barley  to  support  life." 

If  we  undertake  to  study  anywhere  the  cause  of  value  in  land,  it  will  be 
found  to  result  from  diminution  in  the  cost  of  transportation.  The  news- 
papers of  the  day,  in  speaking  of  the  operations  of  the  railroad  recently 
constructed  from  Springfield  (Illinois)  to  the  Illinois  river,  tell  us  that 

«  One  week  before  the  railroad  was  finished,  corn  could  be  had  here  in  any  quantity, 
at  15  cents  a  bushel.  Not  a  bushel  can  now,"  says  the  Saugamon  Journal,  "be  had  for 
less  than  25  cents.  This,"  it  adds,  "  is  the  effect  of  the  completion  of  the  railroad  on  the 
price  of  one  article  of  the  products  of  our  farmers." 

The  first  thing  to  be  paid  by  land  is  transportation.  When  that  is  so 
great  as  to  eat  up  the  whole  proceeds,  the  land  will  remain  uncultivated 


128  THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 

Diminish  the  cost  of  transportation  so  as  to  leave  sufficient  to  pay  the  wages 
of  labour,  and  it  will  be  cultivated,  but  it  will  pay  no  rent.  Diminish  it 
further,  so  as  to  leave  a  surplus  over  and  above  the  reward  of  the  labourer, 
and  the  land  itself  will  acquire  value.  Diminish  it  still  further,  by  removing 
altogether  the  necessity  for  transportation,  making  a  market  on  the  land  for 
all  the  products  of  the  land,  enabling  the  farmer  readily  to  return  to  it  all 
the  refuse  of  its  products,  and  it  will  acquire  the  highest  value  of  which 
land  is  capable.  The  commodity  of  which  the  government  and  people  of 
the  Union  have  most  to  sell  is  land.  In  quantity  it  is  practically  unlimited, 
and  long  before  our  present  territory  shall  have  been  even  laid  out  for  sale, 
rast  countries  will  have  been  brought  within  the  limits  of  the  Union.  In 
quality  it  is  entitled  to  stand  first  in  the  world.  The  area  of  the  coal 
region  is  133,000  square  miles.  Iron  ore  is  everywhere,  untouched.  Copper, 
zinc,  and  almost  all  other  metals  abound.  South  Carolina  has  millions  of 
acres  of  the  finest  meadow-land  unoccupied,  and  she  has  lime  and  iron  ore 
in  unlimited  abundance.  Virginia  is  in  a  similar  condition,  and  yet  people 
are  leaving  both,  when  population  is  all  that  is  needed  to  place  them  in  the 
first  rank  among  the  States  of  the  Union  in  point  of  wealth.  Of  the  three 
States  of  Alabama,  Louisiana,  and  Mississippi,  with  advantages  unrivalled 
for  the  production  of  the  great  clothing  material  of  the  world,  two-thirds 
of  their  whole  surface,  or  83,000,000  of  acres,  yet  remain  unsold.  The  land 
at  the  command  of  the  government  counts  by  hundreds  of  millions,  and  to 
give  to  all  this  value  we  need  only  population. 

In  Europe,  on  the  contrary,  population  is  held  to  be  superabundant. 
Marriage  is  regarded  as  a  luxury,  not  to  be  indulged  in,  lest  it  should  result 
in  increase  of  numbers.  "  Every  one,"  it  is  said,  "  has  a  right  to  live,"  but 
this  being  granted,  it  is  added  that  "no  one  has  a  right  to  bring  creatures 
into  life  to  be  supported  by  other  people."*  Poor  laws  are  denounced,  as 
tending  to  promote  increase  of  population — as  a  machine  for  supporting  those 
who  do  not  work  "  out  of  the  earnings  of  those  who  do."t  No  man,  it  is 
thought,  has  "a  right"  to  claim  to  have  a  seat  at  the  great  table  provided  by 
the  Creator  for  all  mankind,  or  that  "  if  he  is  willing  to  work  he  must  be 
fed."  Labour  is  held  to  be  a  mere  "commodity,"  and  if  the  labourer  can- 
not sell  it,  he  has  no  "  right"  but  to  starve — himself,  his  wife,  and  his  chil- 
dren. "  The  particular  tendency  to  error  apparent  in  the  prevalent  social 
philosophy  of  the  day,"  to  which  it  is  deemed  necessary  to  direct  special 
attention,  is  "the  unsound,  exaggerated,  and  somewhat  maudlin  tenderness 
with  which  it  is  now  the  fashion  to  regard  paupers  and  criminals."!  Such 
are  the  doctrines  of  the  free-trade  school  of  England,  in  which  Political 
Economy  is  held  to  be  limited  to  an  examination  of  the  laws  which  regulate 
the  production  of  wealth,  without  reference  to  either  morals  or  intellect.  Under 
such  teaching  it  is  matter  of  small  surprise  that  pauperism  and  crime  in- 
crease at  a  rate  so  rapid. § 

Throughout  Europe,  men  are  held  in  low  esteem.  They  are  considered 
to  be  surplus,  and  the  sooner  they  can  be  expelled  the  better  it  will  be  for 
those  who  can  afford  to  remain  behind.  To  accomplish  this  object,  Coloniza- 
tion Societies  are  formed,  and  Parliament  is  memorialized  by  men  who  desire 
to  export  their  fellow-men  by  hundreds  of  thousands  annually.  Whig  and 
Tory  journals!)  unite  in  urging  the  necessity  for  expelling  man  from  the 

•  J.  S.  Mill's  Principles  of  Political  Economy. 
•*•  Edinburgh  Review,  October,  1849.  $  Ibid. 

§  See  article  on  Transportation,  Blackwood's  Magazine,  November,  1849. 
|  The  number  of  Blackwood's  Magazine,  just  received,  advocates  the  application  of 
£300,000  per  annum  to  this  object. 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  129 


land  of  Britain.  Secretaries  of  State , furnish  ingenious  calculations  as  to 
the  amount  required  for  accomplishing  the  work  of  expulsion.  On  all 
hands,  it  is  agreed  that  men  are  too  numerous, and  that  their  numbers  grow 
too  fast,  and  yet  there  is  not  a  country  in  Europe  that  can  justly  complain 
of  over-population.  Ireland,  the  type  of  th\sfree-trade  system,  has  millions  of 
acres  of  her  richest  lands  as  yet  untouched,  that  would  alone,  if  drained, 
yield  food  in  abundance  for  the  whole  population. 

It  is  not,  however,  the  labourer  alone  that  stands  in  need  of  aid.  The 
condition  of  the  land-owner  is  little  better.  This  system  of  universal  discord 
is  thus  described  in  one  of  the  journals  of  the  day: 

«  The  state  of  the  country  is  frightful.  The  assassinations  are  computed  at  more  than  ten 
per  week,  half  a  hundred  per  month,  which,  added  to  the  systematic  starvation  of  almost 
another  hundred,  in  the  same  time,  gives  a  state  of  things  without  parallel  in  modern 
civilization.  With  this  diminution  of  the  people,  the  million  of  work-house  inmates  and 
dependents  increases.  In  less  than  a  month  it  will  be  more  than  a  proprietor's  life  is 
worth  to  be  seen  by  his  tenantry.  Rents,  which  of  course  are  nominal  in  collection,  have, 
therefore,  lately  sunk  to  the  fourth  of  their  nominal  amount.  Lands,  let  hitherto  at  £2 
10«.  per  acre,  are  offered  at  less  than  15«;  and  such  is  the  exasperation  of  the  starving 
millions,  that  the  landlords  are  afraid  further  to  aggravate  their  sufferings." 

The  Parliament  of  England  is  now  engaged  in  passing  laws  to  transfer, 
for  the  fourth  time  in  little  more  than  two  centuries,  the  mass  of  Irish  pro- 
perty to  English  undertakers.  The  little  cultivator  of  land  has  been 
ruined.  Labour  has  become  utterly  valueless,  although  labour  alone  is 
needed  to  bring  into  cultivation  7,000,000  of  acres  of  the  richest  soils  in  the 
world,  now  unproductive. 

The  land-owner  of  India  has  been  ruined.  The  immense  body  of  vil- 
lage proprietors  that  but  half  a  century  since  existed  in  that  country,  helping 
and  governing  themselves,  has  disappeared. 

The  land-owner  of  the  West  Indies — of  Demerara  and  Berbice — has 
been  ruined,  and  the  condition  of  the  labourers  has  not  been  improved. 

The  land-owner  of  Portugal — the  continental  colony  of  Great  Britain — 
has  been  ruined,  and  with  diminished  value  of  land  there  has  been  steady 
deterioration  of  civilization,  until  the  name  of  Portugal  has  become  almost 
synonymous  with  weakness  and  barbarism. 

If  we  look  to  Canada,  Nova  Scotia,  or  New  Brunswick,  the  same  picture 
meets  our  view.  "Land  of  the  same  quality,  at  one  minute  north  of  the 
imaginary  line  dividing  the  provinces  from  the  Union,  is  worth  less  than 
half  as  much  as  that  which  is  one  minute  south  of  it.  Lord  Durham, 
in  his  report,  made  but  a  few  years  since,  says  that  "land  in  Vermont  and 
New  Hampshire,  close  to  the  line,  is  five  dollars  per  acre, and  in  the  adjoining 
British  townships,  only  one  dollar,"  and  that  on  the  northern  side  of  the  line, 
with  superior  fertility,  it  is  "  wholly  unsaleable  even  at  such  low  prices." 
Canada  has  no  market  on  the  land  for  the  products  of  the  land,  and  the  cost 
of  transportation  eats  up  the  product,  much  of  which  is  absolutely  wasted 
because  it  cannot  go  at  all  to  market.  The  labour  of  men,  women,  a.nd 
children,  and  that  of  wagons  and  horses,  is  everywhere  being  wasted,  and 
therefore  it  is  that  the  Canadian  desires  a  change  of  government  that  will 
enable  him  to  obtain  a  protective  tariff.  Give  him  that — annex  him  to  the 
Union — and  his  land  will  acquire  value  similar  to  that  of  the  Union.  Far- 
mers will  then  grow  rich,  and  labourers  will  grow  rich,  and  the  power  to  con- 
sume cloth  and  iion  will  grow  with  the  same  rapidity  with  which  it  re- 
cently grew  with  us. 

Every  colony  of  England  would  gladly  separate  from  her,  feeling  that 
connection  with  her  is  synonymous  with  deterioration  of  condition.  Every 
one  would  gladly  unite  its  fortunes  with  those  of  our  Union,  feeling  that 


130  THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 

connection  with  us  is  synonymous  with  improvement.  The  reason  for 
all  this  is,  that  the  English  system  is  based  upon  cheap  labour,  and  tends 
to  depress  the  many  for  the  benefit  of  the  few.  In  our  system,  it  is  the 
many  who  govern ;  and  experience  having  taught  them  that  prosperity  and 
free  trade  with  England  are  inconsistent  with  each  other,  we  have  "  free 
trade"  tariffs  with  protective  duties  of  thirty  per  cent.,  and  likely  to  be  in- 
creased. The  colonies  are  ruined  by  free  trade,  and  they  desire  annexation, 
that  they  may  have  protection. 

This  idea  of  cheap  labour  is  universal  among  English  colonists.  It  is 
found  in  all  their  books.  If  they  fail  to  succeed,  it  is  because  labour  is  "too 
high."  They  are  willing  to  receive  convicts,  because  they  can  be  had 
"cheap."  They  tell  their  correspondents  that  men  may  be  had  from  the 
Continent  who  will  work  for  small  wages,  while  Englishmen  must  have 
large  ones,  i.  e.  enough  to  feed  and  clothe  themselves  comfortably.  They 
emancipate  the  negroes,  and  then  they  find  their  labour  "  too  dear,"  and 
send  to  India,  or  to  the  coast  of  Africa,  for  "  cheap"  labourers.  The  Times 
informs  us  that  the  great  works  of  England  are  based  upon  an  ample  supply 
of  "  cheap  labour."  The  whole  system  looks  to  the  degradation  of  the 
labourer,  by  requiring  him  to  underwork  and  supplant  the  labourer  of  other 
countries,  with  all  the  disadvantage  of  distance  and  heavy  cost  of  transporta- 
tion. Protection  looks  to  raising  the  value  of  labour,  and  thus  promoting 
the  annexation  of  individuals,  and  the  establishment  £f  perfect  free  trade 
between  ourselves  and  the  people  of  Europe  by  inducing  them  to  transfer 
themselves  to  our  shores.  It  is  a  bounty  on  the  importation  of  the  machine 
we  need — man — to  give  value  to  the  machine  we  have  in  such  abundance 
— land.  It  leads  to  perfect  free  trade — the  annexation  of  nations — by  raising 
the  value  of  man  throughout  the  world. 

It  has  been,  at  times,  matter  of  surprise  that  the  hundreds  of  thousands 
who  have  arrived  in  this  country  have  been  so  instantly  absorbed  that 
their  presence  has  been  unfelt,  and  that  the  more  we  received,  the  larger 
was  the  quantity  of  food,  fuel,  cloth,  and  iron  given  in  exchange  for  labour, 
but  such  is  the  natural  result  of  a  system  which  tends  to  enable  the  miner 
and  the  worker  in  iron,  the  spinner  and  the  weaver,  to  combine  their  exer- 
tions with  those  of  the  farmer  and  planter.  Had  the  policy  of  1 828  remained 
unchanged,  and  were  we  now  receiving  a  million  of  men,  the  only  effect 
that  would  be  observed,  would  be  that  wages  and  profits,  and  the  power  of 
labourer,  landowner,  and  capitalist,  to  command  the  good  things  of  life 
would  be  steadily  increasing,  and  with  each  step  forward  the  tendency  to 
immigration  and  to  increase  in  the  value  of  land  would  grow  with  accelerated 
pace.  We  need  population. 

In  the  thorough  adoption  of  this  course  by  the  people  of  the  Union,  is  to 
be  found  the  remedy  of  the  ills  of  both  the  land-owners  and  the  labourers  of 
the  rest  of  the  world,  and  the  removal  of  the  discords  now  so  universal. 
That  we  may  clearly  see  how  it  would  contribute  towards  producing  har- 
mony, we  must  first  inquire  into  the  causes  of  discord. 

The  labourers  of  the  world  have  one  common  interest,  and  that  is  that 
labour  should  become  everywhere  productive  and  valuable.  The  more 
wheat  produced  in  return  to  a  given  quantity  of  labour,  the  more  of  it  will 
the  shoemaker  obtain  for  his  work,  and  the  more  advantageously  the  shoe- 
maker can  apply  his  labour,  the  more  readily  will  the  farmer  provide  him- 
self and  his  family  with  shoes.  Such,  likewise,  is  the  case  with  nations. 
It  is  to  the  interest  of  all  that  labour  in  all  should  become  productive,  and  if 
the  labour  of  the  cotton-growing  nation  become  unproductive,  that  of  the 
sugar  or  wheat-growing  nation  feels  the  effect  in  an  increased  difficulty  of 
obtaining  clothing. 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 


131 


The  land-owners  of  the  world  have  one  common  interest,  and  that  is,  that 
.and  should  everywhere  become  productive  and  valuable.  It  does  so  be- 
come with  every  increase  in  the  skill  and  intelligence  of  the  labourer,  as 
may  be  seen  by  a  comparison  of  times  present  with  times  past  in  every  im- 
proving, country,  or  by  a  comparison  of  the  various  countries  of  the  world  at 
the  present  moment.  In  Russia  land  itself  has  little  value.  In  Belgium, 
where  cultivation  is  carried  on  with  intelligence  elsewhere  unknown,  it  has 
great  value. 

Every  increase  in  the  facility  of  obtaining  cloth  for  food,  or  food  for  cotton, 
diminishes  the  quantity  of  labour  to  be  given  for  food  or  clothing,  and  enables 
the  producer  to  obtain  other  commodities  and  things  needed  for  the  improve- 
ment of  his  mind,  or  which  tend  to  enable  him  more  advantageously  to  apply 
his  labour.  The  landed  proprietor  of  England  is  therefore  directly  inte- 
rested in  the  improvement  of  the  mode  of  cultivating  cotton  in  the  United 
States,  because  it  tends  to  improve  the  condition  of  the  man  who  labours  on 
his  land  ;  and  the  cotton-grower  is  interested  in  the  improvement  of  the 
wheat-grower  of  Russia,  because  the  latter  is  thereby  enabled  to  purchase 
more  clothing. 

Among  the  land-owners  and  'labourers  of  the  world  there  is,  therefore, 
perfect  harmony  of  interests.  Between  them  stand  the  men  employed  in 
the  work  of  transportation,  conversion  and  exchange — ship-owners,  manu- 
facturers, and  merchants. 

The  object  had  in  view  in  the  prohibition  of  manufactures  in  the  colo- 
nies was  that  of  compelling  the  colonists  to  use  ships  that  they  would  not 
otherwise  require,  and  to  pay  manufacturers  and  merchants  for  doing  for 
them  those  things  that  they  could  have  better  done  themselves.  The 
necessary  consequence  of  this  was  discord,  which  in  our  case  led  to  war, 
and  vast  waste  of  time  and  money.  Another  consequence  was,  that  the 
people  engaged  in  the  work  of  transportation,  conversion,  and  exchange,  in- 
creased more  rapidly  than  the  producers,  and  England,  from  having  food  to 
sell,  became  a  purchaser  of  foreign  food.  Next  came  the  corn-laws,  by 
which  the  impqrtation  of  food  was  to  be  prevented,  for  the  -benefit  of  land- 
owners, and  other  laws  prohibiting  the  export  of  machinery,  for  the  benefit 
of  the  owners  of  ships  and  machinery  of  various  kinds.  By  the  one  the 
owners  of  land  were  enabled  to  tax  the  labourer  and  the  mechanic,  and  by 
the  other  the  mechanic  was  enabled  to  tax  the  world  in  return.  The  effect 
has  been  that  of  preventing  the  application  of  English  labour  and  capital  to 
the  work  of  production,  and  driving  it  into  the  far  less  profitable  work  of 
transportation,  conversion,  and  exchange,  to  such  an  extent  that  the  con- 
verters have  at  length  become  masters  of  the  land-owners,  and  have  abolished 
restrictions  on  the  import  of  food  which  the  latter  had  established  for  their  pro- 
tection, and  as  revolutions  never  go  backward,  we  may  fairly  conclude  that  the 
corn-laws  will  not  be  re-established.  The  result,  thus  far,  has  been  to  ruin 
the  landholders  of  Ireland,  and  the  next  result  must  be  to  ruin  those  of  Eng- 
land, if  the  system  be  allowed  fair  play. 

The  people  of  Russia,  we  are  assured,  have  been  compelled  to  waste  food 
for  want  of  a  market.  Rather  than  do  this,  they  would  give  a  bushel  of 
wheat  for  a  yard  of  cloth.  That  they  cannot  afford  to  do  this,  we  are 
assured;  but  what  else  can  they  do?  If  they  cannot  make  cloth  they  must 
buy  it,  and  they  must  give  an  equivalent,  and  if  that  be  even  bushels  for 
yards,  they  must  give  them.  Until  Russia  can  make  a  market  for  this  now 
surplus  food,  it  will  seek  a  market  at  any  price,  and  the  price  in  England 
cannot  much  exceed  the  cost  of  transportation  between  the  farm  on  which 
it  was  produced  and  the  town  at  which  it  is  consumed.  Nearly  the  whole 
of  that  price  must  go  to  the  exchanger,  to  the  loss  of  both  land  and  labour, 


132  THE    HARMONY  OF    INTERESTS. 

both  of  which  must  tend  towards  the  Russian  level,  now  a  very  low  one, 
because  of  the  absence  of  a  market  on  the  land  for  the  products  of  the  land. 

The  object  of  the  now  dominant  class  in  England  is  that  of  bringing 
about  free  trade  with  the  world.  Such  a  measure  adopted  by  this  country 
would  close  every  furnace  and  rolling-mill,  and  every  cotton  and  woollen 
factory  in  the  country,  and  would  diminish  the  value  of  both  labour  and 
land,  by  compelling  the  producer  of  food  to  seek  a  market  in  England. 
Similar  measures  adopted  by  the  Zoll-verein,  would  compel  the  people  of 
Germany  to  do  the  same,  attended  with  similar  results.  The  market  of 
England  would  be  borne  down  with  the  weight,  and  the  price  would  fall  so 
low  as  utterly  to  destroy  the  power  of  the  labourer  on  land  to  pay  rent  for 
its  use,  and  the  power  of  the  owner  to  improve  it.  The  class  intermediate 
between  the  producers  in  various  parts  of  the  world,  would  daily  grow  in 
numbers  and  strength,  and  the  productiveness  of  labour  and  land  would 
daily  diminish,  with  steady  diminution  in  the  value  of  both. 

On  the  other  hand,  let  us  suppose  the  people  of  the  Union,  of  Russia,  and 
of  Germany,  to  adopt  such  measures  as  would  enable  them  to  consume  on 
the  land  the  whole  of  the  food  produced  upon  the  land,  and  thus  to  put  a 
stop  to  the  enormous  imports  by  which  the  English  agriculturist  is  now 
being  crushed.  The  immediate  effect  would  be  that  the  labour  and  land  of 
all  those  countries  would  rise  in  value,  and  therewith  there  would  be  an  in- 
crease in  the  value  of  both  in  England.  The  demand  for  labour  here  would 
speedily  drain  off  the  surplus  hands  employed  in  factory  labour,  and  the 
increased  demand  for  home-grown  food  would  induce  the  application  of 
labour  and  capital  to  production,*  and  the  value  of  both  would  rise.  Con- 
sumption would  increase  as  labour  became  more  productive,  and  the  power 
of  the  producers  would  be  restored,  while  that  of  the  mere  exchangers  would 
be  diminished. 

To  the  improvement  of  the  condition  of  labour  and  land  in  the  United 
Kingdom  the  abolition  of  the  colonial  system  is  essential.  Its  maintenance 
involves  the  payment  of  taxes  to  an  amount  that  is  terrific,  all  of  which 
must  be  paid  by  the  producers  and  those  who  own  the  machine  of  pro- 
duction, abroad  or  at  home.  The  tax  that  is  nominally  paid  by  the  man 
who  sells  the  wheat,  or  by  him  who  transports  it,  is  really  paid  by  the  man 
who  produces  it,  and  by  him  that  consumes  it.  Three-fourths  of  the  nation 
are  engaged  in  the  work  of  transporting,  converting,  or  exchanging  the  pro- 
ducts of  others,  adding  nothing  whatever  to  the  quantity  produced,  while 
Jiving  out  of  it,  and  thus  deteriorating  the  condition  of  the  land-owners  and 
labourers  of  England  and  of  the  world. 

The  land-owners  of  England  have  been  the  legislators  of  England.  They 
made  the  system  which  produced  our  revolution — that  which  has  depopu- 
lated India,  and  must  ruin  every  country  subjected  to  it — and  they  are  now 
paying  the  penalty.  Each  step  towards  the  degradation  of  the  people  by 
whom  they  were  surrounded  has  been  attended  by  loss  of  power  in  them- 
selves. Their  policy  has  converted  the  little  occupant  into  the  hired 
labourer,  and  the  labourers  on  land  into  the  tenants  of  lanes  and  alleys  in 
Liverpool!  and  Manchester.  Throughout  much  of  Scotland  they  have  sub- 
stituted sheep  for  the  men  whom  they  have  driven  to  take  refuge  in  Glas- 
gow,, and  with  each  such  step  they  have  weakened  themselves,  converting 

*  At  a  recent  meeting  in  London,  Dr.  Buckland  asserted  that  the  product  of  all  the  clay 
lands  of  England  might  be  doubled  by  a  moderate  expenditure  for  drainage. 

f  The  greatest  crowding  of  population  in  a  neighbourhood  is  in  a  district  in  Liverpool, 
England,  containing  a  population  of  8000  on  49,000  square  yards  of  ground,  being  in  th<* 
proportion  of  657,963  to  a  square  mile. 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  133 

those  who  were  their  own  support  into  the  tools  of  those  who  live  at  the  cost 
of  both.  The  exchanger  has  set  his  foot  upon  their  necks.  Commerce  is 
King.  They  are  prostrate,  and  so  they  must  remain  until  they  shall  have 
help  from  abroad.  Their  natural  allies  are  the  land-owners  of  the  rest  of  the 
world.  The  East  India  Company,  as  the  great  land-owner  of  India,  is 
greatly  interested.  That  country  is  becoming  daily  less  and  less  able  to 
pay  taxes,  and  the  power  so  to  do  must  diminish  with  the  continuance  of 
the  system.  Were  the  machinery  now  employed  in  converting  cotton  into 
cloth  for  India  employed  in  making  cloth  in  India,  thus  making  a  market 
on  the  land  for  its  products,  the  culture  of  cotton  would  revive,  the  demand 
for  food  would  increase,  population  would  grow,  and  jungle  would  be  cleared, 
and  the  Company  might  then  obtain  a  constantly  increasing  rent  from  taxes 
constantly  decreasing  in  their  weight,  paid  by  a  people  constantly  improving 
in  condition.  The  price  of  labour  would  rise,  and  the  necessity  for  armies 
would  diminish,  and  the  Company  might  then,  at  no  distant  period,  sell  out 
its  establishments  to  a  people  who  would  thereafter  govern  themselves. 

It  is  to  the  people  of  the  United  States,  however,  that  they  must  chiefly 
look  for  help.  Owners  already  of  the  chief  part  of  North  America,  they  are 
likely  soon  to  own  the  whole.  The  national,  not  party  or  sectional,  adop- 
tion of  the  protective  policy  would  at  once  raise  the  value  of  land  throughout 
the  Union,  because  it  would  then  be  felt  that  a  market  would  everywhere  be 
made  on  the  land  for  the  products  of  the  land.  The  British  provinces  would 
then  speedily  be  incorporated  into  the  Union,  and  the  supply  of  food  to 
British  markets  would  cease;  Cuba  and  Mexico  would  follow,  and  thus  would 
be  made  a  market  for  the  population  of  all  Southern  Europe;  and  with  each 
such  step  the  value  of  labour  would  rise,  followed  by  a  necessity,  on  the  part  of 
the  landholders  everywhere,  for  an  effort  to  retain  their  rent-payers,  if  they 
would  preserve  the  v&lue  of  their  land.  Spain  and  Italy  would  become  manu- 
facturers for  themselves,  and  thus  the  colonial  system,  would  gradually 
pass  out,  and  with  it  the  power  of  the  exchangers  over  the  labourers  and 
land-owners. 

It  is  not  by  immigration  alone  that  the  population  of  the  Union  would  be 
augmented,  and  increased  value  given  to  the  land  which  so  much  abounds. 
The  present  system  degrades  the  country  to  build  up  great  cities,  to  be- 
come the  resort  of  tens  of  thousands  who  would  have  remained  at  home 
among  parents  and  friends,  had  furnaces,  rolling-mills,  cotton  or  woollen 
mills  afforded  them  employment  for  time  and  mind.  The  same  cause 
compels  another  portion  to  fly  to  the  West;  and  while,  in  the  one  case, 
we  have  the  poverty,  vice,  and  disease  of  crowded  cities,  in  the  other  we 
have  those  of  scattered  population;  and  men,  women, and  children  starve  in 
New  York,  while  other  men,  women,  and  children  perish  of  fevers  incident 
to  the  occupation  of  new  countries  in  advance  of  the  arrangements  that 
would  have  resulted  from  the  more  gradual  extension  of  the  area  of  settle- 
ment. It  will  .be  said  that  here  is  discord.  If  the  city  population  did  not 
grow,  what  would  become  of  the  owners  of  city  lots  ?  The  harmony  of  in- 
terests is  here,  as  everywhere  else,  perfect.  Towns  and  cities  would  grow 
more  rapidly  than  ever,  but  they  would  grow  more  healthfully,  preserving 
a  nearer  relation  to  the  population  of  the  country,  whose  trade  they  desired 
to  perform.  New  York  would  cease  to  be,  as  now,  a  great  wen,  absorbing 
all  the  profits  of  hundreds  of  thousands  of  the  poor  farmers,  her  customers, 
who  give  ten  days'  labour  employed  in  raising  corn  for  the  labour  of  one 
day  employed  in  producing  British  iron.  The  country  and  the  city  would 
grow  together,  and  the  jealousy  of  the  country  towards  the  city  would 
upeedily  pass  away. 

The  people  of  China  constitute  a  world  of  themselves.    They  have  littla 


134  THE    HARMONY -OF    INTERESTS. 

intercourse  with  the  exterior  world,  nor  is  the  example  of  Hindostan  likely 
to  produce  any  desire  for  its  extension:  certainly  not,  while  they  shall  con- 
tinue to  recollect  that  their  desire  to  prohibit  the  importation  of  opium  in- 
volved them  in  a  war  that  resulted  in  the  destruction  of  cities  and  the  ruin 
of  hundreds  of  thousands  of  innocent  people.  The  system  of  that  country 
is  directly  the  reverse  of  ours,  in  the  fact  that  the  government  is  in  the  hands 
of  one,  while  here  it  is  in  the  hands  of  all.  In  this,  it  labours  under  infinite 
disadvantage,  yet  the  spectacle  there  presented  of  the  results  of  combined 
action  puts  to  shame  our  boasted  civilization.  A  recent  writer  thus  describes 
the  condition  of  the  people : — 

«  The  farms  are  small,  each  consisting  of  from  one  to  four  or  five  acres,  indeed,  every 
cottager  has  his  own  little  tea  garden,  the  produce  of  which  supplies  the  wants  of  his 
family,  and  the  surplus  brings  him  in  a  few  dollars,  which  are  spent  on  the  other  neces- 
saries of  life.  The  same  system  is  practised  in  every  thing  relating  to  Chinese  agriculture. 
The  cotton,  silk,  and  rice  farms,  are  generally  all  small,  and  managed  upon  the  same  plan. 
There  are  few  sights  more  pleasing  than  a  Chinese  family  in  the  interior  engaged  in 
gathering  the  tea-leaves,  or,  indeed,  in  any  of  their  other  agricultural  pursuits.  There  is 
the  old  man,  it  may  be  the  grandfather,  or  even  the  great-grandfather,  patriarch-like  direct- 
ing his  descendants,  many  of  whom  are  in  their  youth  and  prime,  while  others  are  in 
their  childhood,  in  the  labours  of  the  field.  He  stands  in  the  midst  of  them,  bowed  down 
with  age.  But,  to  the  honour  of  the  Chinese  as  a  nation,  he  is  always  looked  up  to  by  all 
with  pride  and  affection,  and  his  old  age  and  gray  hairs  are  honoured,  revered  and  loved. 
When,  after  the  labours  of  the  day  are  over,  they  return  to  their  humble  and  happy 
homes,  their  fare  consists  chiefly  of  rice,  fish  and  vegetables,  which  they  enjoy  with  great 
zest,  and  are  happy  and  contented.  1  really  believe  there  is  no  country  in  the  world 
where  the  agricultural  population  are  better  off  than  they  are  in  the  north  of  China. 
Labour  with  them  is  pleasure,  for  its  fruits  are  eaten  by  themselves,  and  the  rod  of  the 
oppressor  is  unfelt  and  unknown."* 

Let  this  be  compared  with  the  results  of  the  system  that  has  desolated 
Ireland  and  India,  and  that  drives  our  people  to  Oregon  and  California, 
while  men  are  everywhere,  among  ourselves,  half-cultivating  large  farms, 
when  they  might  obtain  treble  the  result  from  half  the  surface,  and  let  it 
then  be  determined  which  is  the  one  that  tends  most  to  promote  the  pros- 
perity and  happiness  of  the  labourer,  and  to  improve  the  condition  of  the 
owner  of  land. 

The  policy  of  England  tending  to  dispersion,  she  desires  to  facilitate  the 
making  of  roads  by  which  all  the  commodities  of  the  world  may  be  brought 
to  her,  thence  to  be  returned  to  the  places  from  whence  they  came,  retaining 
«o  large  a  portion  as  to  cause  the  destruction  of  the  land  and  its  owner. 
Lower  India  is  utterly  exhausted,  and  England  desires  railroads  to  more 
distant  points,  which  will  be  then  exhausted  in  their  turn.  From  1834  to 
1840  she  lent  us  iron  to  make  roads  in  new  countries,  and  we  were  ruined 
by  dispersion.  From  1843  to  1847,  we  filled  up  the  spaces,  the  policy 
being  that  of  concentration,  and  we  grew  rich.  The  present  policy  is  that 
of  dispersion.  It  is  proposed  to  make  a  railroad  to  the  Pacific,  that  men  may 
scatter  themselves  more  widely,  although  we  now  occupy  a  space  that 
would  be  sufficient  for  almost  the  population  of  the  world,  if  properly  culti- 
vated. The  more  roads  we  make  in  the  now-settled  States,  the  richer  and 
stronger  we  shall  grow,  and  the  greater  will  be  the  value  of  land.  The 
more  roads  we  make  in  yet  unsettled  lands,  the  poorer  and  weaker  we  shall 
grow,  and  the  less  will  be  the  value  of  land.  It  behooves  the  farmer, 
then,  to  look  carefully  to  every  scheme  for  promoting  dispersion. 

The  value  of  labour  and  of  capital  is  dependent  on  the  quantity  of  both 
that  can  be  given  lo  the  work  of  production.  Every  increase  in  the  quan 

•  Fortune's  Wanderings  in  China. 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  135 

tity  of  either  required  to  be  given  to  the  work  of  conversion  and  transportation, 
tends  to  diminish  the  value  of  all.  Every  diminution  in  the  quantity  tends 
to  increase  the  value  of  all.  The  nearer  the  consumer  and  the  producer  can 
be  brought  together,  the  greater  is  the  quantity  of  capita)  and  labour  that  can 
be  given  to  the  work  of  production,  the  smaller  is  that  which  is  required 
for  transportation,  and  the  more  rapid  is  the  advance  in  the  value  of  both 
labour  and  land. 

We  are  now  separating  the  consumer  from  the  producer,  and  the  conse- 
quence is,  that  five  per  cent,  stocks  are  at  par,  land  is  cheap,  and  wages 
are  low.  Were  the  tariff  of  1842  re-enacted,  interest  would  rise  to  six  per 
cent,  and  labour  would  command  a  large  return — the  consequence  of  which 
would  be  a  great  increase  in  the  consumption  of  food,  and  wool,  and  cotton, 
and  the  value  of  land  would  rise. 

The  annexation  of  a  million  of  people,  emigrants  from  Europe,  to  our 
community,  establishes  free  trade  with  them.  The  annexation  of  the  land 
and  the  people  of  Canada,  and  the  other  British  possessions,  would  enlarge 
the  domain  of  perfect  free  trade.  So  would  that  of  Cuba,  Mexico,  Ireland, 
or  even  England,*  and  free  trade  thus  established  would  be  beneficial  to  all, 
the  annexers  and  the  annexed. 

The  people  of  the  north  would  not  object  to  the  annexation  of  Canada, 
although  such  a  measure  could  profit  them  but  little.  They  and  the  Canadians 
are  both  sellers  of  food,  and  it  is  the  superior  value  of  wheat  and  flour  on  the 
south  side  of  the  line  by  which  they  are  divided  that  induces  the  Canadians 
to  desire  to  be  brought  within  the  Union.  The  people  of  the  South  would 
oppose  the  admission  of  Canada,  although  the  eject  of  such  a  measure 
would  be  to  convert  the  Canadians  into  large  customers,  instead  of  per- 
mitting them  to  remain  small  ones.t  Once  within  the  Union,  the  con- 
sumption of  cotton  in  the  British  provinces  would  speedily  rise  from 
20,000,000  of  yards,  weighing  5,000,000  of  pounds,  to  30,000,000  of 
pounds,  and  thus  would  the  planter  gain  a  market  for  50,000  bales  of  cotton. 
The  material  interests  of  the  South  would  be  promoted  by  the  annexation 
of  Canada,  yet  would  the  South  oppose  the  measure  on  the  ground  of  sup- 
posed danger  to  political  interests. 

The  South  would  advocate  the  admission  of  Cuba  into  the  Union,  although 
the  effect  of  such  a  measure  would,  under  existing  circumstances,  be  that  of 
ruining  the  cultivation  of  sugar,  the  only  resource  to  which  the  planter 
now  can  look  with  hope — the  only  one  that  has  enabled  him  to  bear  up 
under  the  late  and  present  hopeless  condition  of  the  cotton  culture.  The 
man  of  the  north  would  oppose  the  measure,  although  it  would  give  him 
sugar  at  a  cost  far  below  the  present  one,  and  a  market  for  grain  and  cloth 
that  would  absorb  of  both  to  a  vast  amount.  Political  interests  are  thus  at  va- 
riance with  material  ones.  In  both  cases  the  discord  is  but  apparent,  while  the 
harmony  is  real.  The  establishment  of  that  real  freedom  of  trade  which 
results  from  the  immigration  of  individuals,  or  from  the  annexation  of  com- 
munities, can  never  fail  to  be  productive  of  benefit  to  all. 

The  cotton  planter,  as  we  have  seen,  no-.v  sells  his  product  in  the  cheap- 

•  Ire!  ind  and  England  are  mentioned  here  only  to  show  that  the  difficulty  of  having 
perfect  free  trade  with  them  would  be  removed  by  the  change  in  the  value  of  latxm 
that  would  result  from  change  of  their  political  system. 

•(•  Export  to  British  North  America  in  the  first  six  months  of 

1846.  1847,  1848.      .  1849. 

Plain  calicoes         .         7,483,318  7,339,686  6,745,536  5,979,991 

Prints   «'     .        .         8,483,16J  6,497,845  4,589,811  5,701,857 


16,966.481         13,837,531         11,335,347       11,681,848 


136  THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 

est  market  and  buys  his  cloth  and  iron  in  the  dearest  one.  He  gives  away 
the  one,  and  is  then  unable  to  buy  the  other.  By  changing  his  system,  and 
compelling  the  loom  to  come  to  the  cotton, and  the  anvil  to  come  to  the  food, 
he  will  sell  ^his  cotton  and  obtain  his  cloth  and  iron  in  exchange  for 
labour  that  is  now  being  wasted.  He  will  then  export  cloth  to  all  the 
world,  and  the  necessity  for  resorting  to  the  cultivation  of  sugar  will  cease. 
The  people  of  the  North  will  then  consume  all  the  sugar  that  Cuba  can1 
produce,  and  those  of  Cuba  will  require  pounds  of  cotton  where  now  they 
consume  but  ounces.* 

CHAPTER  THIRTEENTH. 

HOW  PROTECTION  AFFECTS  THE  MANUFACTURER. 

THE  shipowner  stands  between  the  producer  of  cotton  and  his  customers, 
and  the  larger  proportion  the  quantity  to  be  transported  bears  to  the  number 
of  ships  to  do  the  work,  the  higher  will  be  freights.  We  might  thence  suppose 
that  his  interest  would  be  promoted  by  the  pursuance  of  a  course  that 
would  compel  the  cotton  to  go  to  the  loom,  and  that  he  would  be  injured  by 
the  adoption  of  one  requiring  the  loom  to  come  to  the  cotton.  Directly 
the  reverse,  however,  as  we  have  seen,  '«  the  fact.  The  more  the  loom  can 
be  made  to  come  to  the  cotton,  the  in  OK  valuable  are  the  services  of  men, 
the  greater  the  number  of  men  to  be  imported,  the  larger  the  number  of  com- 
modities that  can  be  exported,  and  the  larger  the  business  for  ships. 

The  manufacturer,  in  like  manner,  stands  between  the  producer  and  the 
consumer  of  cotton,  and  the  larger  the  quantity  of  cotton  to  be  converted 
compared  with  the  machinery  of  conversion,  the  larger  will  be  his  charge 
for  the  use  of  his  machinery.  It  might,  therefore,  be  supposed  that  he 
would  be  injured  by  the  adoption  of  measures  tending  to  place  the  loom  in  the 
cotton-fields  of  the  South,  or  on  the  coal-fields  of  the  West,  but  the  reverse 
is  the  fact.  The  more  people  make  coarse  cloth  in  the  South  and  West, 
the  more  will  there  be  to  require  fine  cloth  and  silks  from  the  East,  and 
the  greater  the  demand  for  labour  in  the  one,  the  greater  will  be  the  requi- 
sitions made  upon  the  other  for  the  skill  they  have  already  acquired,  with 
a  constant  increase  of  wages,  and  equally  constant  increase  in  the  power  of 
consuming  food,  cloth,  and  iron.  The  more  they  can  make  their  exchanges 
at  home,  .with  men  whose  labour  is  valuable,  the  larger  will  be  the  equiva- 
lent received  for  their  own  labour ;  and  the  more  rapid  the  increase  in  the 
value  of  that  of  others,  the  greater  will  be  the  value  of  their  own.  Every 
measure  tending  to  break  down  the  monopoly  of  machinery  tends  to  increase 
the  value  of  man  throughout  the  world,  and  none  could  have  that  effect  to 
such  an  extent  as  would  the  transfer  of  the  machinery  of  Lowell  to  the 
cotton-fields,  to  be  replaced  by  other  machinery  of  a  higher  order. 

But,  it  will  be  said,  "  The  people  of  the  South  need  no  further  protection 
than  they  now  have.  They  are  satisfied  with  30  per  cent.,  and  why,  if  they 
can  go  on  to  manufacture  without  any  increase  of  duty,  should  they  impose 
higher  duties  on  fine  cloths  and  silks,  for  the  benefit  of  the  North  and  East? 
We  know  that  the  latter  cannot  make  fine  muslins  at  the  present  rate  of 
duty — nor  can  they  manufacture  silk  goods  in  competition  with  France, 
The  South  will  work  up  its  cotton  and  make  its  own  exchanges,  leaving  the 
duty  as  it  stands,  and  then  Lowell,  Lawrence,  and  Providence  must  go 
down,  for  competition  is  impossible."  Such  are  the  views  perpetually  pro« 
mulgated  by  journals  whose  editors  profess  great  acquaintance  with  political 

*  The  export  from  Great  Britain  to  all  the  foreign  West  India  Islands  is  bu»  little  ovei 
20,000,000  of  yards. 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 


137 


economy,  and  whose  speculations  are  received  as  authority  by  their 
readers.  Nothing,  however,  could  be  less  in  accordance  with  the  true  in- 
terests of  the  planters. 

The  larger  the  quantity  of  the  machinery  prepared  for  the  conversion  of 
cotton  into  cloth,  the  smaller  will  be  the  charge  for  its  use.  The  planter 
requires  to  rid  himself  of  a  monopoly  that  limits  the  increase  of  that  ma- 
chinery, and  compels  him  to  give  to  the  owners  of  the  little  that  exists, 
whether  English  or  American,  a  share  of  the  product  entirely  dispropor- 
tioned  to  its  value  as  compared  with  that  of  the  machinery  required  for  pro- 
ducing his  cotton.  To  break  down  one  monopoly  and  establish  another 
would  not  answer  his  purpose,  and  yet  such  would  be  the  result  at  which 
he  would  arrive  were  he  to  pursue  a  course  that  would  merely  substitute 
Augusta  for  Lowell,  or  Graniteville  for  Lawrence.  The  man  of  the  South 
would,  and  necessarily,  do  as  he  of  the  North  now  does,  buy  his  cotton 
at  the  market  price,  as  fixed  in  England,  and  sell  his  goods  at  the  market 
price,  as  fixed  in  England,  for  until  the  quantity  of  machinery  shall  be 
so  far  increased  as  to  prevent  the  accumulation  of  large  stocks  in  England, 
the  price  must  continue  to  be  there  fixed  for  the  world;  and  so  long  as  we 
shall  continue  to  be  compelled  to  go  there  for  any  portion  of  our  supplies  of 
cloth,  the  price  of  the  whole  will  continue  to  be  fixed  by  the  cost  of  obtaining 
the  last  small  portion.  What  the  planter  needs  is  that  the  price  shall  be 
fixed  here,  for  both  cotton  and  cloth,  and  that  it  may  be  so,  he  requires  an 
increase  of  the  quantity  of  machinery  ready  to  do  his  work,  and  not  the  mere 
substitution  of  that  of  Southern  men  for  that  of  Northern  men. 

How  indispensably  necessary  it  is  that  they  should  do  so  will  b?  obvious 
from  an  examination  of  the  diagram  given  at  page  75.  It  is  there  shown  how 
enormous  are  the  charges  of  the  manufacturers  when  the  quantity  for  cotton 
requiring  to  be  converted  bears  a  large  proportion  to  the  machinery  for  con- 
verting it.  In  the  following  table  are  given, 

First.  The  amount  of  the  crop. 

Second.  The  prices  of  cotton  in  Liverpool,  by  which  those  of  the  rest  of 
the  world  are  settled.  The  dates  taken  are  March,  1844,  July,  1845,  May, 
1846,  and  June,  1847. 

Third.  The  price  of  best  mule  twist,  No.  2  per  pound,  at  the  same  periods 
of  time. 

Fourth.  The  price  the  whole  crop,  allowing  twelve  per  cent,  for  waste, 
would  yield,  if  converted  into  this  description  of  yarn. 

Fifth.  The  yield  to  the  planter,  supposing  the  whole  crop  so  sold,  from 
which  are  to  be  deducted  all  the  freights,  charges,  &c.,  between  his  plantation 
and  Liverpool. 

Sixth.  The  amount  retained  by  the  manufacturer  as  his  charge  for  con- 
verting cotton-wool  into  yarn. 


Year. 


Crop. 


Prii 


Price 

of  twist. 


Amount  of  twist.          Price  of  crop. 


Charge  for 
conversion. 


1843-4  815,000,000  6d.  10K  £31,000,000  £20,000,000  £11,000,000 

1844-5  958,000,000  4  llf  41,000,000  16,000,000     25,000,000 

1845-6  840,000,000  4|      9|  30,000,000  16,500,000      13,500,000 

1846-7  711,000,000  7  10£  27,500,000  20,700,000       6,800,000 

If  we  deduct  from  the  crop  of  1846-7,  the  comparatively  small  sum 
required  for  the  payment  of  freight,  charges,  &c.,  and  from  that  of  1844-5, 
the  large  sum  required  for  the  same  purposes,  it  will  be  seen  how  insignifi- 
cant is  the  return  to  the  planter  for  a  large  crop  compared  with  what  he 
receives  for  a  small  one. 

In  1847,  the  manufacturer  gave  7d.  and  sold  at  an  advance  of  about  fifty 
per  cent. — i.  e.  he  charged  half  as  much  for  converting  the  wool  into  yarn 


THE    HARMONY    OF   INTERESTS. 


as  he  paid  for  the  wool  itself.  In  1845,  when  he  paid  4ef.  he  sold  at  nearly 
a  shilling  —  i.  f.,  he  charged  twice  as  much  for  the  work  of  twisting  the  wool 
as  he  paid  for  the  wool.  He  was  enabled  to  do  this,  because  of  two 
reasons:  —  First,  the  machinery  of  conversion  was  disproportioned  to  the 
quantity  of  cotton  to  be  converted;  and  second,  the  market  for  cotton  goods 
was  extending  itself,  because  the  world  was  comparatively  peaceful,  and 
labour  was  being  applied  more  productively  than  usual.  The  effect  of  the 
change  that  has  since  occurred  will  be  seen  from  the  following  view  of  the 
cperations  of  1848. 


Crop.  Price.  o      Amount  of  yarn.    Amount  of  crop. 

1847-8  940,000,000  4d.  8d.  £28,000,000  £15,600,000  £12,400,000 
The  machinery  had  been  increased,  but  the  market  was  gone.  Wars, 
revolutions,  and  threats  of  war  and  revolution,  had  destroyed  it.  The 
planter  had  4d.  per  pound,  of  which  a  large  portion  was  swallowed  up  in 
the  cost  of  transportation  ;  and  the  manufacturer  obtained  as  much  for  twist- 
ing the  wool  into  yarn  as  the  planter  received  for  raising,  ginning  and 
baling  it,  and  for  transporting  it,  first  to  the  place  of  shipment,  and  thence 
t.o  Liverpool,  together  with  all  the  charges  of  the  numerous  persons  through 
whose  hands  it  passed  on  its  way. 

The  planter  needs  machinery  adequate  to  the  conversion  of  his  crop,  and 
also  a  market  for  it  when  converted.  The  failure  of  either  is  equally  fatal 
to  him. 

The  first  he  cannot  have  under  the  monopoly  system.  It  is  one  of  mere 
gambling;  and  while  a  few  make  fortunes,  the  many  are  ruined.  The 
distant  few,  already  wealthy  —  the  cotton-lords  of  England  —  are  not  the 
men  to  whom  he  must  look  to  provide  him  with  it.  It  is  to  himself,  and  the 
many  like  himself,  at  home.  Fuel  and  iron  ore  abound  in  the  South,  and 
cotton  fields  furnish  cheap  sites  for  the  erection  of  acres  of  factory,  in  which 
the  product  of  thousands  of  acres  of  cotton  could  be  converted  by  aid  of  the 
Jabour  that  is  now  wasted  —  the  coal  and  the  iron  ore  whose  powers  remain 
unused  —  the  water  powers  that  remain  unimproved.  By  their  aid,  every 
pound  of  cotton  now  produced  in  the  South,  not  required  by  Great  Britain 
and  others  for  their  own  immediate  consumption,  could  be  converted  into 
yarn  or  cloth,  and  cheaply  furnished  to  the  world.  The  planter  would 
then  receive  a  yard  of  cloth  for  a  pound  and  a  half  of  cotton,  instead  of 
giving  five  pounds  for  one. 

The  difference  between  the  price  of  the  crop  of  cotton,  in  Liverpool,  and 
the  price  of  yarn,  also  in  Liverpool,  in  1844-5,  would  have  exceeded  a 
hundred  millions  of  dollars,  being  twice  the  amount*  that  it  would  cost  to 
place  in  the  cotton  fields  of  the  South  spindles  for  converting  into  yarn  the 
whole  crop  that  is  now  sent  without  the  limits  of  the  Union. 

He  would  then  have  yarn  or  cloth  to  sell  instead  of  cotton,  and  then  his 
crop  would  speedily  rise  to  five  millions  of  bales,  for  the  labour  and  manure 
now  wasted  on  the  road  would  go  upon  the  land.  Capital  now  absorbed  by 
brokers,  ship-owners,  and  distant  manufacturers,  would  be  applied  to  the  mak- 
ing of  railroads,  the  improvement  of  the  machinery  of  cultivation,  the  diffu- 
sion of  knowledge,  and  in  a  thousand  other  ways  tending  to  render  labour 
more  productive.  Where,  however,  is  he  to  find  a  market  for  his  products, 
thus  increased  ? 

Commerce  is  but  an  exchange  of  equivalents  ;  and  if  the  supply  of  iron, 
silk,  coffee,  tea,  and  other  commodities  required  by  the  planter,  do  not  keep 
pace  with  increase  in  the  supply  of  cotton,  he  will  be  constantly  giving 

•  See  Plough.  Loom,  and  Anvil,  No.  XIX.,  page  421. 
VOL.  II.—  86 


THE   HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  139 

more  cotton  for  less  iron  or  silk,  and  thus  others  will  enjoy  the  whole  ad- 
vantage resulting  from  his  increased  exertion.  That  the  advantage  may,  as 
justly  it  should,  be  his,  it  is  necessary  that  the  production  of  the  commo- 
dities that  he  desires  to  receive  in  exchange  go  on  to  increase  in  a  manner 
correspondent  with  that  which  he  desires  to  give.  If  it  does  so,  he  gives 
labour  for  labour.  If  it  does  not,  he  gives  more  labour  for  less  labour. 

The  question  now  arises:  Can  the  production  of  the  world,  under  the 
existing  system,  go  on  to  increase  in  such  a  manner  as  to  give  to  the  planter 
a  proper  equivalent  for  his  production  ?  The  answer  is  to  be  found  in  the  fact, 
that  it  has  already  failed  to  do  so,  and  that  he  is  even  now  obliged  to  abandon 
cotton  for  wheat  and  sugar.  How,  then,  can  it  be  expected  to  do  so  in 
future  ?  The  average  crop  must  speedily  reach  3,000,000  of  bales  ;  and, 
when  it  shall  have  done  so,  his  condition  will  be  worse  than  at  present. 
The  production  of  the  world  does  not  increase  correspondingly  with  our 
own ;  and  until  it  can  be  made  so  to  do,  we  must  work  at  disadvantage, 
giving  much  labour  for  little  labour. 

With  all  its  immense  mass  of  rich  and  unimproved  land,  the  United  King- 
dom produces  little.  It  does  not  even  feed  itself.  It  has  a  little  iron  and 
coal  to  sell,  but  a  demand  for  an  extra  hundred  thousand  tons  of  the  former 
would  greatly  increase  the  price  of  the  whole  without  producing  any  ma- 
terial increase  in  the  demand  for  cotton ;  for  the  rich  iron-master  would  be 
made  richer,  while  the  poor  miner  would  remain  as  poor  as  now.  Great 
Britain  has  scarcely  any  thing  to  sell  but  services — not  products.  To  her 
we  cannot  look  for  a  market. 

Of  the  people  of  France,  almost  half  n  million  of  those  most  capable  of 
working  employ  themselves  in  carrying  muskets,  and  a  large  portion  of  the 
labour  of  the  rest  is  employed  in  raising  food  for  them  and  other  non-pro- 
ducers, in  making  clothing  for  them  to  wear,  and  powder  for  them  to  burn 
They  have,  therefore,  few  products  to  sell,  and,  like  Great  Britain,  they  have 
little  to  offer  in  exchange  but  services. 

The  people  of  Italy  and  India  raise  some  silk,  but  the  chief  part  of  both 
are  otherwise  occupied  than  hi  labours  of  production;  and  so  are  they  like 
to  be,  and  they  cannot  increase  their  product  to  keep  pace  with  ours. 
Germany  maintains  large  armies,  and  produces  little  to  sell.  So  it  is  with 
Spain  and  Portugal.  Mexico  has  a  little  silver  and  cochineal:  but  the  quan- 
tity does  not  grow,  nor  is  it  likely  so  to  do.  Look  where  we  may,  the  power 
of  'production  is  not  only  small,  but  incapable  of  increase  under  existing 
circumstances,  and  unless  a  change  can  be  effected,  we  cannot  find  markets 
for  the  products  of  our  constantly  increasing  population.  What  is  the  re- 
medy ?  It  is  to  bring  the  people  to  the  place  where  alone  their  labour  can 
be  made  productive,  and  thus  establish  perfect  free  trade  with  them. 

Fifty  thousand  English  miners  and  furnace  men  distributed  among 
the  coal  and  iron-ore  fields  of  Pennsylvania,  Ohio,  Indiana,  Tennessee 
and  Alabama,  would  produce  600,000  tons  of  bar  iron,  to  be  exchanged 
with  the  farmer  for  his  wheat,  and  the  planter  for  his  cotton,  and  the 
latter  would  then  obtain  a  ton  of  the  one  for  a  bale  of  the  other,  instead 
of  giving  two  or  three  for  one.  He  could  then  make  roads  to  go  to  market, 
and  the  labour  of  his  people  would  become  valuable,  and  they  would  con- 
sume five  times  the  cloth  they  now  consume,  and  thus  would  be  made  a 
double  market  for  his  cotton. 

The  same  number  of  Italians  would  raise  quadruple  the  silk  we  now 
consume,  and  they  would  be  large  consumers  of  food  and  cotton.  Were  the 
market  for  silk  once  made  here,  we  should  in  a  little  time  raise  as  much  as 
all  the  world  beside,  and  consume  almost  all  we  raised. 

The  planter  and  the  farmer  must  make  a  market  on  the  land  for  the 


140  THE    HARMONY    OF   INTERESTS. 


products  of  the  land,  by  bringing  here  the  people  they  desire  to  employ 
in  the  production  of  the  commodities  they  require  to  consume ;  or  they  must 
continue  to  give  a  continually  increasing  quantity  of  labour  for  a  continually 
decreasing  one.  By  adopting  the  first  course,  they  would  convert  the  con- 
sumers of  one  pound  into  consumers  of  twenty  pounds,  and  the  consumers 
of  twenty  pounds  into  consumers  of  forty  pounds.  By  adopting  the  opposite 
policy — that  now  called  free  trade — they  will  convert  consumers  of  twenty 
pounds  into  consumers  of  one. 

Were  it  now  known  in  Europe  that  such  was  the  fixed  and  unalterable 
policy  of  the  nation,  the  present  year  would  see  the  transfer  of  population  to 
the  extent  of  half  a  million  of  persons,  and  of  capital,  in  the  form  of  ma- 
chinery, to  an  incalculable  extent;  and  once  here,  here  they  would  stay,  in- 
creasing at  once,  and  immensely,  the  market  for  both  food  and  cotton.  Five 
years  would  scarcely  elapse  before  it  would  reach  a  million ;  for  with  every  year 
the  power  to  obtain  food,  clothing,  and  the  machinery  for  profitably  applying 
labour,  would  increase,  offering  new  inducements  for  the  transfer  of  both 
labour  and  capital.  With  each  year,  the  desire  of  our  neighbours,  north 
and  south,  to  enter  the  Union  would  increase,  and  but  few  would  elapse 
before  it  would  embrace  all  North  America,  and  a  population  of  forty  or  fifty 
millions  of  people,  themselves  consuming  far  more  than  all  the  cotton  we  now 
raise.  The  Canadian,  in  the  Union,  would  find  his  labours  trebly  profitable, 
for  he  would  obtain  treble  the  iron  and  cloth  in  return  for  less  exertion. 
The  mines  of  Nova  Scotia  and  New  Brunswick  would  give  forth  their 
treasures  in  return  to  the  labour  of  men  who  now  can  consume  but  little  food 
orclothing,but  would  then  havepowertoconsume  much.  The  mines  of  Mexico 
would  be  made  to  yield  three  dollars  where  now  they  yield  but  one;  and 
all  would  obtain  silver,  gold,  iron,  lead,  cloth,  and  all  other  of  the  necessaries, 
comforts,  and  luxuries  of  life,  at  diminished  cost  of  labour. 

With  each  step  of  this  progress  there  would  be  increased  demand  for  the 
labour,  both  physical  and  mental,  of  the  manufacturers  of  the  North,  for  the 
demand  for  fine  cloths  and  for  silk  would  grow  with  the  growth  of  the  power 
to  produce  coarse  cloth  and  iron;  the  demarfd  for  fine  books  would  grow 
with  the  increase  of  school-books  and  newspapers ;  and  the  demand  for  cotton 
and  woollen  machinery  would  grow  with  the  increase  in  the  power  to  obtain 
railroad  iron. 

Between  the  manufacturer  and  the  planter  there  is,  therefore,  perfect 
harmony  of  interest.  All  are  alike  interested  in  the  exertion  to  shake  off 
the  load  imposed  upon  them  by  the  present  monopoly  of  machinery ;  but 
of  all  the  agriculturist  is  most  interested.  Its  tendency  is  to  reduce  the  power 
of  production  throughout  the  world,  to  diminish  the  power  of  consumption, 
and  thus  to  destroy  the  customers  of  both  planter  and  farmer.  The 
tendency  of  protection  is  to  raise  the  value  of  labour  throughout  the  world, 
by  increasing  the  estimation  in  which  man  is  held  abroad,  and  thereby  to 
augment  production  and  the  power  of  consumption.  With  every  increase 
in  the  tendency  to  fly  from  Europe,  it  would  be  felt  more  necessary  to 
endeavour  to  keep  the  people  at  home.  By  that  process,  and  that  alone, 
will  the  labourer  of  the  world  be  raised  to  a  level  with  our  own. 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  141 

CHAPTER  THIRTEENTH. 

HOW    PROTECTION    AFFECTS    THE    CAPITALIST. 

« 

IF  protection  be  "  a  war  upon  labour  and  capital,"  it  must  tend,  by  les- 
sening the  productiveness  of  labour,  to  prevent  its  proper  employment,  and 
thus  to  diminish  the  power  of  accumulating  wealth  by  the  clearing,  drain- 
ing, and  enclosing  of  lands,  the  building  of  houses,  the  construction  of  roads 
and  bridges  for  facilitating  transportation,  and  of  machinery  for  converting 
the  products  of  the  earth  into  the  form  required  to  fit  them  for  the  use  of  man. 
If,  on  the  contrary ,  it  be  really,  as  its  name  imports,  protection  to  the  labourer, 
then  must  it  increase  the  power  of  accumulating  wealth,  to  be  used  for 
increasing  his  productive  power,  and  thus  facilitating  the  accumulation  of 
further  wealth. 

The  great  machine  of  production  is  the  land.  The  more  time  and  mind 
that  can  be  given  to  its  cultivation,  the  more  rapid  will  be  the  increase  of 
production,  the  larger  will  be  the  return  to  capital,  and  the  more  rapid  the 
improvement  in  the  condition  of  man. 

The  more  time  and  mind  that  must  be  given  to  the  preparation  of  ma- 
chinery of  transportation,  the  slower  will  be  the  increase  of  production,  the 
smaller  will  be  the  return  to  capital,  and  the  slower  the  improvement  in  the 
condition  of  man.  The  object  of  protection  is  that  of  bringing  the  consumer  to 
take  his  place  by  the  side  of  the  producer;  thus  saving  transportation,  and 
facilitating  the  application  of  labour  to  production,  while  diminishing  the 
number  of  persons  among  whom  the  produce  is  to  be  divided. 

A  furnace,  capable  of  producing  5000  tons  of  iron  per  annum,  may  be 
put  in  motion  at  a  cost  of  $30,000.  These  5000  tons  would  exchange  in 
Ohio  for  150,000  bushels  of  wheat,  the  produce  of  12,500  acres  of  land  that 
has  cost  $40  dollars  an  acre,  equal  to  $500,000,  for  the  labour  employed 
in  clearing  and  draining  it,  in  making  fences,  building  barns,  houses  and 
doing  all  other  things  necessary  to  fit  it  for  production.  Let  us  suppose  the 
furnace,  houses  for  the  men,  preparation  of  the  mines,  &c.  to  have  cost 
$100,000,  and  yet  the  capital  employed  is  five  to  one,  to  obtain  precisely 
the  same  return.  This,  however,  is  not  all.  The  wheat  weighs  4000  tons, 
and  to  transport  this  to  New  York  and  thence  to  Liverpool  requires  more 
capital  in  wagons  and  canal  boats  than  would  have  been  required  to  produce 
the  iron  at  home ;  and  far  more  capital  employed  in  ships  than  would  have 
done  it ;  and  thus  we  have  a  total  of  seven  or  eight,  if  not  even  ten  times  the 
capital  that  is  needed,  while  the  return  is  precisely  the  same — 5000  tons  of 
iron. 

The  capital  invested  in  building  the  furnace,  the  houses,  and  in  preparing 
the  mines,  would  have  been  permanent,  and  it  would  have  given  value  to 
every  acre  around,  because  it  would  have  made  a  market  on  the  land  for 
the  products  of  the  land,  whereas,  the  wagons,  ships,  and  canal-boats  disap- 
pear with  time  ;  and  the  land,  constantly  cropped,  becomes  exhausted,  and 
is  frequently  abandoned  by  the  owners,  and  thus  is  the  whole  wasted. 

The  farmer  will  say  that  he  could  have  obtained  no  more  iron  on  the  spot 
for  the  produce  of  his  land,  that  the  iron-master  paid  him  for  his  wheat  and 
charged  him  for  his  iron  according  to  the  price  in  Liverpool,  and  that  he 
profited  as  much  by  exchanging  in  the  one  place  as  in  the  other.  This  is  too 
nearly  true.  So  long  as  he  is  compelled  to  compete  with  the  inferior  labour 
of  Europe,  so  long  must  he  accept  this  as  a  consequence.  So  long  as  he  is 
Dependent  on  England  for  a  market  for  a  single  million  of  bushels  of  wheat, 
she  will  fix  the  price  of  all  that  is  produced  ;  and  so  long  as  he  is  dependent 
on  her  for  the  last  few  thousand  tons  of  iron,  she  will  fix  the  price  of  all  that 


142  THE    HARMONY   OF    INTERESTS. 

is  consumed.  He  needs  to  bring  the  home  consumption  of  food  up  to  the 
production,  and  the  home  production  of  iron  up  to  the  consumption,  and 
the  price  of  both  will  then  be  fixed  at  home.  A  little  capital  will  then  yield 
much  iron.  Now,  much  capital  ie  required  to  produce  little  iron. 

It  has  been  shown  (page  74,)  that  the  whole  of  the  cotton,  311,000,000 
of  pounds,  consumed  by  the  people  of  Great  Britain  and  Ireland  in  1845 
and  1846,  would  have  been  paid  for  by  6,260,000  pieces  of  plain  cottons, and 
210,000  tons  of  iron,  delivered  in  Liverpool.  By  the  time  this  cloth  and 
iron  reached  the  plantation  they  would  have  shrunk  into  5,000,000  pieces 
of  cloth  (120,000,000  of  yards)  and  160,000  tons  of  iron;  and  perhaps  into 
a  still  smaller  compass,  even  supposing  them  imported  duty  free.  To  have 
produced  this  120,000,000  yards  of  cloth  in  those  two  years  would  have 
required  20  mills  of  moderate  size,  each  capable  of  converting  into  cloth 
2000  bales  of  cotton,  and  to  have  produced  this  iron  would  have  required 
little  more  than  two  establishments,  such  as  the  one  described  at  page  42, 
as  existing  in  the  Lehigh  region  of  Pennsylvania. 

To  transport  the  700,000  bales  of  cotton  must  have  required  60  ships, 
each  carrying  2000  bales,  and  making  three  voyages  a  year.  Add  to  these, 
steamboats,  warehouses,  packing-machinery,  &c.,  on  this  side  of  the  Atlan- 
tic, and  the  docks,  drays,  warehouses,  cars,  railroads,  &c.  on  the  other  side, 
and  it  will  be  found  that  the  capital  required  for  the  work  of  transporting 
these  311,000,000,  after  they  had  reached  the  place  of  shipment,  was 
three  times  more  than  would  have  furnished  machinery  that  would 
have  enabled  the  planter  to  convert  the  whole  of  them  on  the  spot.  For  all 
this  the  planter  pays,  and  therefore  it  is  that  we  find  him  to  have  sent  away 
311,000,000  of  pounds  of  cotton,  to  be  exchanged  in  Liverpool  for  74,000,000 
of  pounds  in  the  form  of  cloth,  and  then  to  be  reduced  to  60,000,000  by 
the  time  they  arrive  on  the  plantation,  thus  giving  five  pounds  of  cotton  for 
one  yard  of  cloth.  It  is  obvious  that,  even  thus  far,  much  capital  is  required 
to  obtain  small  product. 

Let  us  now  see  what  was  the  amount  employed  by  the  planter  in  produc- 
ing, at  the  place  of  shipment,  the  250,000,000  of  pounds  that  he  gave  in  those 
two  years  to  the  people  of  England,  for  twisting  and  weaving  the  60,000,000 
that  came  back  in  the  form  of  cloth.  The  annual  average  is  155,000,000  sent 
out,  and  30,000,000  returned,  125,000,000  being  lost  on  the  road.  The  ave- 
rage product  of  cotton  land  is  under  300  pounds  an  acre,  at  which  rate  416,000 
acres  would  be  required  for  the  production  of  the  125,000,000,  saying  nothing 
of  the  remainder  of  the  various  plantations  not  under  cultivation.  The  average 
amount  of  labour,  per  acre,  required  to  fit  these  lands  for  production,  includ- 
ing fencing,  houses,  machinery,  gin-houses,  roads,  &c.,  has  not  been  less 
than  one  hundred  days,  and  I  should  be  safe  in  putting  it  much  higher. 
Estimating  those  days  at  only  50  cents  each,  we  obtain  $50  as  the  actual 
expenditure  required  for  each  acre  of  land,  at  which  rate  the  capital  in  land 
would  be  $20,800,000.  Estimating  the  hands  employed  at  no  more  than 
the  land,  we  have  a  further  sum  of  $20,800,000.  Next,  we  have  the  capital 
employed  in  transportation  to  the  place  of  shipment,  and  that  some  idea 
may  be  formed  of  that,  I  give  the  following  statement,  by  one  who  furnishes 
it  as  the  result  of  his  personal  observation : — 

a  Of  the  expense  of  this  first  movement,  some  idea  may  be  formed  by  those  who  have 
seen  it  coming  over  dreadful  roads,  up  to  the  hub,  dragged  slowly  along  20,  30,  or  40 
miles,  as  we  have  seen  it  coming  into  Natchez  and  Vicksburg,  hauled  by  five  yoke  of 
oxen  carrying  2800  to  3000  pounds,  and  so. slowly  that  motion  was  scarcely  perceptible. 
So  many  perish  in  the  yoke  in  winter  and  spring  that  it  has  been  said,  with  some  exag- 
geration, that  you  might  walk  on  dead  oxen  from  Jackson  to  Vicksburg.  That  was  be- 
fore the  railroad  waa  made.  A  wagon  is  loaded  up,  say  14  miles  from  Natchez,  and 


THE    HARMONY   OF    INTERESTS.  143 

ttarted  at  night,  and  reaches  there  in  time  to  get  back  the  next  night  time  enough  to  « load 
up."  Thus  ten  oxen  have  been  wearing  and  tearing  and  dropping  their  manure  on  the 
road  for  24  hours  to  make  one  load."* 

Here  we  have  five  yoke  of  oxen  transporting  3000  pounds  in  a  day,  a  dis- 
tance of  only  fourteen  miles.  Supposing  the  average  distance  to  be  75  miles, 
and  the  roads  to  be  similar,  it  would  take  them,  on  an  average,  a  week  to 
transport  that  quantity  from  the  plantation  to  the  place  of  shipment.  I  will, 
however,  suppose  that  a  single  yoke  of  oxen  can  transport  four  bales,  or 
1800  pounds,  per  week.  The  number  of  loads  would  be  70,000,  to  be 
transported  in  the  shipping  season,  which  averages  about  eight  months.  To 
do  this  would  require,  always  on  the  road, 

2300  wagons,  average  cost  $80,  .         .         .  $175,000 

4400  oxen,  «        "    $40,       .        .        .  175,000 

2200  men,  «        "  $600,  .        .        .          1,320,000 


1,670,000 

Total  capital,  ....     $43,270,000 

This  is  a  very  low  estimate  of  the  fixed  labour,  called  capital,  given  to  the 
production  at  the  place  of  shipment  of  these  125,000,000  of  pounds  of  cotton. 
Let  us  now  see  how  much  is  the  fixed  capital,  the  use  of  which  is  given  by 
the  distant  manufacturers  in  exchange  for  all  this.  A  mill  that  will  work  up 
2000  bales  of  cotton  can  readily  be  produced  at  a  cost  not  exceeding 
$100,000.  These  2000  bales  contain  900,000  pounds  of  cotton.  Thirty-four 
such  mills  would  work  up  30,000,000  of  pounds,  and  the  cost  of  all  these 
mills  would  be  $3,000,000,  or  about  one-fifteenth  of  the  capital  employed  by 
the  planter.  Need  we  wonder  that  the  planter's  capital  yields  him  a  small 
return? 

The  more  directly  power  is  applied,  the  more  efficiently  it  is  applied. 
The  more  machinery  that  intervenes,  the  less  is  the  power  and  the  smaller  the 
effect.  The  planter  obtains  his  cloth  and  iron  by  the  indirect  means  of 
raising  cotton  and  fobd  to  send  abroad,  whereas,  if  he  would  apply  his  power 
directly  to  the  production  of  both,  production  would  be  doubled  and  his 
power  of  accumulation  quadrupled.  Had  the  planters  of  1845  and  '46,  pro- 
vided themselves  with  machinery  for  the  conversion  of  cotton  into  cloth,  to 
the  extent  of  the  155,000,000  consumed  in  England,  they  would  have  seen 
furnaces  rise  among  them  capable  of  producing  treble  the  iron  they  could 
have  obtained  for  that  cotton,  and  thus  would  have  been  made  a  market  on  the 
land  for  the  products  of  the  land,  the  result  of  which  would  have  been  that 
they  would  have  obtained  far  more  for  the  balance  of  their  crop  than  they 
did  obtain  for  the  whole.  The  produce  of  those  155,000,000  would  then 
have  bought  them  iron  sufficient  to  make  many  hundred  miles  of  railroad, 
and  thus,  while  diminishing  their  necessity  for  resorting  to  distant  mar- 
kets, they  would  have  increased  their  power  so  to  do,  by  increasing  their 
capital.  It  will  be  said,  however,  that  while  the  labour  employed  in  pro- 
ducing the  cotton  is  set  down,  there  is  no  allowance  for  that  required  for  its 
conversion  into  cloth.  No  such,  allowance  is  needed.  The  labour  of  men, 
women,  and  children,  now  absolutely  wasted  in  every  county  of  the  South 
is  more  than  would  be  required  for  five  such  mills,  and  the  cotton  that  is 
lost  for  want  of  aid  in  harvest-time  would  twice  over  pay  for  it. 

The  whole  of  those^  125,000,000  of  pounds  of  cotton  consumed  by  the  people 
of  Great  Britain  and  Ireland  was  thus  absolutely  wasted,  and  therefore  it  was 

•  Skinner's  Journal  of  Agriculture,  Vol.  Ill,  p.  483. 


144  THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 

that  the  planter  obtained  one  pound  of  cotton  in  exchange  for  five.  Could  the 
charges  be  saved  that  now  intervene  between  the  planter  on  one  side,  and 
the  spinner  and  weaver  on  the  other,  he  would  obtain  two  pounds  of  cloth 
for  three  of  cotton,  and  to  acornplish  this  there  is  but  one  mode  of  proceed 
ing,  and  that  is  to  persuade  the  machinery  to  come  to  the  cotton,  and  thu? 
obviate  the  necessity  for  sending  the  cotton  to  the  machinery.  At  present, 
we  seem  to  be  pursuing  the  same  course  that  would  be  pursued  by  the 
man  who  should  expend  hundreds  of  thousands  of  days  of  labour  in  clearing 
and  cultivating  land  for  the  production  of  wheat,  and  then  wasting  two- 
thirds  of  it  on  the  road  to  and  from  the  distant  mill,  for  want  of  the  applica- 
tion of  three  or  four  thousand  days  of  labour  to  put  up  a  mill  on  his  own  land. 
A  grist-mill  costing  5,000  days  of  labour  will  grind  all  the  grain  produced 
upon  land  that  has  cost  300,000,  and  perhaps  500,000,  days  of  labour  to 
place  it  in  its  existing  condition;  and  yet  the  man  above  referred  to,  would 
waste  on  the  road  annually  more  days  than  would  build  such  an  one. 
So  it  is  with  our  planters  and  farmers.  We  see  in  every  little  com- 
munity that  mills  speedily  rise  for  the  conversion  of  grain  into  flour, 
and  are  satisfied  with  one-eighth  toll;  and  so  we  see  in  every  neighbour- 
hood, where  there  are  timber  and  a  little  water-power,  saw-mills  are  got  up 
for  converting  lumber  into  boards  ;  and  with  each  such  operation,  flour  and 
boards  are  obtained  at  less  cost  of  labour,  and  the  farmer  has  to  give  less 
of  wheat,  and  of  timber,  to  have  them  converted  into  flour  and  boards.  What 
would  the  wheat-grower  say  who  should  have  to  give  five  bushels  for  get- 
ting one  back  in  flour* — and  what  should  the  cotton-grower  say  to  getting 
back  one  bale  of  cotton  in  the  form  of  cloth  1  Let  him  reflect  on  this  q  uestion,  and 
then  answer  the  following  one  :  Why  should  not  every  community  of  some- 
what larger  size  have  in  like  manner  its  own  place  for  converting  cotton 
into  cloth  ?  Could  that  be  done,  the  planter  would  obtain  half  the  cloth 
yielded  by  his  cotton. 

The  latter  will  at  first  view  probably  deny  this.  He  will  say:  If  I  sell 
my  cotton  to  go  to  Manchester,  it  will  produce  rne  five  cents.  If  I  sell  it  to 
the  manufacturer  on  the  ground,  he  will  give  me  no  more.  If  I  buy  Engnsn 
cloth,  it  will  cost  me  ten.  If  I  had  a  manufacturer  on  the  ground,  I  should 
pay  the  same.  Such  must  be  the  case  so  long  as  he  shall  find  himself 
compelled  to  compete  in  the  market  of  England  with  the  poor  Hindoo  for 
the  sale  of  his  cotton,  and  compelled  to  purchase  there,  a  part  of  his  supply 
of  cloth,  for  so  long  will  the  prices  of  both  be  fixed  in  Liverpool.  With  every 
step  in  the  progress  of  emancipation,  however,  he  would  find  himself  K. 
gainer.  Let  him  look  around  and  see  how  much  of  the  labour  of  his  neigh* 
bourhood  and  of  his  own  plantation  is  wasted  for  want  of  the  demand  that 
would  be  produced  by  the  vicinity  of  the  factory  ;  and  then  let  him  reflect 
upon  the  advantage  to  be  derived  from  having,  in  that  factory,  a  place  of 
employment  throughout  the  year,  of  the  persons  who  might,  in  case  of  need, 
aid  him  in  his  picking,  and  thus  save  for  him  the  labour  that  is  now  lost  on 
cotton  wasted  in  the  field,  or  overtaken  there  by  frost.  Let  him  consider 
these  things,  and  he  will  probably  find  that  the  loss  in  them  alone  is  equal 
to  the  value  of  the  labour  required  for  the  conversion  of  all  the  cotton  of  the 
neighbourhood  into  yarn.  If  they  could  be  saved,  and  he  could  thus,  with 


*  « In  some  places  in  Virginia — in  Rappahanock,  for  instance — the  farmer  does  pay  as 
much  as  one  barrel  to  get  four  transported  to  Fredericksburgh,  apparpntly  not  stopping  to 
calculate  at  what  price  and  what  yield  per  acre  that  becomes  a  losing  game,  and  appa- 
rently not  reflecting,  that  while  they"  pay  25  cents  for  transporting  one  dollar's  worth  of 
wheat  they  could  transport  the  same  weight,  or  fifteen  dollars'  worth  of  wool— or  $1  50 
of  cheese,  or  $18  worth  of  live  beef— at  the  same  cost!1' — Ibid. 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  145 

the  same  labour,  send  yarn  to  market  instead  of  cotton,  he  and  his  neigh 
hours  would  be  great  gainers  by  the  operation. 

Having  done  this,  let  him  look  to  the  price  at  which  he  sells  his  corn,  and 
see  what  would  be  the  difference  to  him  if  he  had  a  market  on  the  ground 
in  consequence  of  the  conversion  of  some  of  his  neighbours  into  mechanics, 
mill  operatives,  &c.  Instead  of  remaining  poor  on  the  produce  of  little 
pieces  of  land,  they  would  obtain  good  wages,  and  consume  double  their 
present  quantity,  while  producing  none.  He  would  at  once  save  much  of 
the  cost  of  transportation.  He  would  sell  food  at  home  instead  of  having 
to  buy  it,  with  cost  of  commissions  and  transportation  from  his  own  neigh- 
bourhood added  to  it  to  increase  its  price,  at  Manchester  or  Lowell,  and  all 
would  be  great  gainers  by  the  operation. 

Let  him  then  look  to  his  cleared  land,  and  study  what  would  be  its  value 
if  all  the  manure  yielded  by  his  hay,  and  oats,  and  corn,  and  fodder,  went 
back  upon  the  land,  instead  of  being  wasted  on  the  road,  and  if  all  of  that 
yielded  by  his  wheat  and  corn  remained  upon  the  ground  instead  of  going 
to  Lowell  or  Manchester,  and  see  if  he  would  not  be  a  gainer  by  the 
operation. 

Let  him  then  look  to  his  uncleared  land,  and  calculate  how  much  it  would 
cost  him  to  destroy  the-  timber.  Let  him  then  calculate  the  value  of  the 
timber,  if  the  factory  were  near  him,  and  if  the  blacksmith  and  the  shoe- 
maker, the  hatter,  and  the  tanner,  the  bricklayer  and  the  carpenter,  needed 
houses  ;  and  if  a  town  were  growing  up  around  the  mill,  and  its  inhabitants 
wanting  pork  and  meal,  and  milk,  and  beef,  and  flour,  and  potatoes,  and 
mutton,  and  see  if  he  would  not  be  a  gainer  by  the  operation. 

Let  him  look  to  the  quantity  of  land  upon  which  this  timber  stands,  and 
on  which  he  is  paying,  or  losing,  interest.  Let  him  then  look  to  the  quality 
of  that  land,  and  compare  it  with  that  which  he  now  cultivates.  Let  him  calcu- 
late how  many  bushels  of  potatoes  it  would  yield,  and  compare  their  value, 
when  consumed  upon  the  ground,  with  that  of  the  300  pounds  of  cotton 
now  yielded  by  an  acre,  and  see  if  he  would  not  be  a  gainer  by  the 
operation. 

Let  him  add  all  these  things  together,  and  see  if  he  would  not  save  all 
the  freights  and  commissions ;  even  although  he  obtained  no  more  for 
his  cotton,  and  paid  as  much  for  his  cloth.  Let  him  see  if  he  would  not 
obtain  the  full  value  of  his  cotton,  instead  of,  as  now,  obtaining  but  one- 
third  of  it. 

The  great  cities  and  towns  of  the  world  are  built  up  out  of  the  spoils  of 
the  farmer  and  planter.  Looking  around  in  New  York,  or  in  Philadelphia, 
or  Boston,  it  is  not  possible  to  avoid  being  struck  with  the  number  of  per- 
sons who  live  by  merely  exchanging — passing  from  the  producer  to  the 
consumer — producing  nothing  themselves.  Wagons  and  wagoners,  carts 
and  cartmen,  boats  and  boatmen,  ships  and  sailors,  are  everywhere  carrying 
about  cotton,  and  wool,  and  corn,  and  wheat,  and  flour,  as  if  for  the  pleasure 
of  doing  it.  The  man  of  Tennessee  sends  his  cotton  to  Manchester  to  be 
twisted.  His  corn  goes  along  with  it,  to  feed  the  man  who  twists  it.  It 
leaves  him  worth  twenty  cents.  By  the  time  it  is  consumed  by  the  Man- 
chester spinner,  it  is  worth,  perhaps  a  dollar.  The  labourer  buys  it  at  that 
price.  The  manufacturer  gives  him  a  dollar  to  pay -for  it,  and  he  charges 
it  to  the  cloth  at  SI  10.  The  corn  and  cotton  become  cloth,  and  the  Ten- 
nessee man  buys  it  back,  paying  five  bales  for  one!  He  can  sometimes 
send  his  corn,  but  he  can  never  send  his  potatoes,  and  the  reason  why  he 
cannot  is,  that  they  are  of  the  class  of  commodities  of  which  the  earth  yields 
so  largely  that  they  will  not  pay  freight.  The  only  things  he  can  raise  for 
market  ar*  those  of  which  the  earth  yields  little,  and  that  will  therefore  pay 


146  THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 

freight.  He  raises  three  hundred  pounds  of  cotton,  all  of  which  goes  to  market, 
bringing  him  back  but  sixty  fashioned  into  cloth  ;  returning  nothing  to  the 
land  of  what  it  drew  out  of  the  land,  whereas,  if.  he  had  consumers  near 
him,  he  would  raise  almost  as  many  bushels  of  potatoes,  the  manure  for 
which  would  go  upon  the  land  to  enrich  it,  and  make  himself  rich.  He 
could  then  afford  to  clear,  and  ditch,  and  drain,  and  cultivate  the  richest 
land,  now  covered  with  timber,  or  with  water. 

Why  does  he  not  do  these  things?  Why  does  he  not  convert  the  un- 
profitable consumers,  everywhere  around  him,  into  profitable  ones?*  Why 
does  he  continue,  year  after  year,  to  send  his  grain,  or  cotton,  to  the  distant 
mill,  instead  of  bringing,  once  and  for  ever,  the  mill  to  him  ?  The  reason 
maybe  found  in  thenewspapers  every  day.  Two  years  since,  cotton  manufac- 
turers, wool  manufacturers,  and  iron  manufacturers  were  prosperous.  Now 
they  are  all  stopping  work.  Many  are  already  ruined,  and  many  more 
are  likely  so  to  be.  Why  is  this?  Does  it  .arise  out  of  any  change  in  our 
own  affairs  ?  It  does  not.  It  arises  out  of  changes  abroad.  Two  years 
since,  England  made  railroads,  and  consumption  then  was  large.  This  year 
she  does  not  make  roads,  and  consumption  is  small.  Two  years  since,  we 
built  factories  and  furnaces.  This  year,  manufacturers  and  furnace-builders 
are  ruined.  All  of  them  would  be  ruined,  had  they  not  a  Tariff  of  pro- 
tection, inadequate  as  is  that  of  1846,  to  give  them  that  protection  that  is 
needed  to  secure  them  against  such  changes.  Prosperous  they  would  now 
be,  had  the  IP  riff  of  1842  remained  unaltered;  and  the  thousands  em- 
ployed in  them  vvoii'd  have  remained  profitable  customers  for  the  farmers, 
instead  of  being  driven  over  the  country  to  become  the  rivals  of  the  farmer, 
increasing  the  quantity  of  provisions,  of  which  there  is  already  a  redun- 
dance. 

The  capital  employed  in  the  transport  of  cotton  is  more  than  would  build 
mills  to  convert  the  whole  crop  into  cloth.  The  mill  is  saved  labour.  The 
transportation  is  labour  lost,  never  to  be  regained.  The  mills  once  built, 
the  whole  of  that  labour  might  be  applied  to  the  work  of  production,  for 


•  The  following  picture  of  some  of  these  unprofitable  consumers  is  from  a  letter  to  the 
correspondent  of  "  The  New  York  Herald :" — 

"  I  travelled  yesterday  over  a  public  road  twenty  miles,  and  stopped  at  nearly  every 
house.  They  were  occupied  by  what  are  called  'the  poor  white  people.'  I  found  fifty 
log-houses  on  my  route.  You  pass  through  a  forest  and  come  to  cleared  land.  You  see  on 
one  side  of  the  road  a  field  of  corn,  say  five  to  ten  acres ;  off  a  few  rods  back  from  the  road, 
amid  this  corn  stands  a  log  cabin,  the  smoke  curling  up  in  blue  wreaths  even  in  these 
hot  days.  There  is  a  wicket  gate  opening  from  the  road,  through  which  you  pass  and 
follow  a  footpath  until  you  reach  the  entrance  of  the  cabin.  There  is  a  stone  for  a  step, 
and  you  enter.  The  woman  is  spinning.  She  asks  you  to  a  seat,  which  is  made  of 
nickory,  both  uprights  and  the  seat.  There  are  two  or  three  more  like  it.  In  the  corner 
of  the  room  is  a  bed  ;  the  fire-place  is  very  large,  and  the  chimney  is  built  of  mud  outside 
the  hut.  There  are  some  nails  for  hats  and  clothes.  There  is  a  rifle  on  wooden  pins;  a 
shelf,  with  a  few  articles  upon  it  consisting  of  a  broken  comb,  a  Bible  printed  by  the 
American  Bible  Society,  and  a  case-knife.  In  a  corner  is  a  barrel.  Look  into  it,  and  you 
will  find  a  half  bushel  of  corn  meal  inside,  and  over  it,  on  a  string,  is  a  piece  of  bacon. 
There  is  a  cupboard  in  the  corner;  open  that,  and  perhaps  you  will  find  a  cup  and  saucer 
and  a  plate,  and  perhap*  you  won't.  This  a  picture  from  the  life.  You  ask  for  the 
family — '  My  man  is  pulling  fodder.'  '  How  many  children  have  you?'  'Six;' and  by 
and  by  you  will  see  the  whole  half  dozen  flaxy-headed  children  peeping  in  through  the 
crevices  of  the  hut,  for  in  the  summer  season,  as  there  are  no  windows,  the  filling  in  be- 
tween the  logs  is  taken  out  for  air.  You  wonder  how  people  can  live  in  such  a  one-room 
den.  Yet  they  do  live,  and  get  on  very  well.  They  keep  a  cow  sometimes,  a  few  pigs 
to  make  ham  and  bacon,  and  they  raise  corn,  wheat,  and  oats.  The  cabin  is  worth  twenty 
dollars,  if  it  was  to  be  bought." 


THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  147 

the  lost  labour  of  the  hands  upon  the  plantation,  and  of  the  "  poor  white 
people,"  everywhere  throughout  the  South,  is  more  than  would  be  required 
for  the  work  of  conversion.  Protection  seeks  to  enable  the  planter  to  save 
this  labour  and  accumulate  capital. 

It  is  said  to  be  "  a  war  upon  labour  and  capital ;"  but  it  would  here  cer- 
tainly seem  to  be,  what  its  name  denotes,  protection  to  the  producer  of  food 
and  wool  against  a  system  which  compels  him  to  give  the  use  of  fifteen  dollars 
of  capital  in  exchange  for  the  use  of  one.  Its  object  is  that  of  promoting  con- 
centration. That  of  the  system  falsely  called  free-trade  is  to  promote  dis- 
persion. The  last  twelve  months  have  witnessed  the  expulsion  of  many 
thousands  of  men,  and  many  millions  of  capital  to  California,  not  one-tenth 
of  which  will  ever  return.  One  of  the  papers  of  the  day  states  that 

"  Considerable  excitement  has  been  created  here  (New York)  among  those  who  have  made 
shipment*  of  merchandise  to  California,  by  the  receipt  of  letters  from  commission  houses 
in  San  Francisco,  containing  account  of  sales.  It  appears  that  the  charges  have,  in  several 
instances,  used  up  entirely  the  proceeds  of  the  sales.  We  hear  it  stated  in  dry-good  cir- 
cles, that  one  of  our  largest  auction-houses  sent  out  over  two  hundred  thousand  dollars' 
worth  of  dry-goods  last  winter,  for  which,  up  to  this  time,  they  have  received  no  proceeds." 

Hundreds  of  ships  are  now  in  the  Pacific,  doing  nothing  and  earning 
nothing,  when  they  might  be  carrying  cotton,  and  we  are  now  building 
other  ships  to  replace  them.  The  capital  now  invested  in  those  ships  and 
in  California  would  have  built  mills  for  the  conversion  of  half  the  cotton  of 
the  South,  and  furnaces  for  the  production  of  as  much  iron  as  is  produced  in 
Great  Britain.  For  ail  this  waste  of  capital  the  farmer  and  planter  pay»  for 
the  harmony  of  interests  is  so  perfect  that  the  losses  of  the  ship-owner  and 
manufacturer  are  invariably  borne,  in  largest  proportion,  by  them.* 

*  The  following  estimate  of  the  quantity  of  labour  and  capital  lost  by  ourselves  and 
wasted  in  California,  is  from  the  New  York  Herald,  and  is  not  far  from  the  truth : — 

"  It  is  estimated  that  about  500  vessels  had,  up  to  the  1st  of  November,  arrived  at  San 
Francisco,  from  the  United  States  and  Europe,  and  that  at  least  100,000.  people  were,  at 
that  time,  in  California.  The  average  cost  of  outfit  for  each  person  cannot  be  less  than 
$200,  which  makes  an  aggregate  of  $20,000,000.  It  will  cost  an  average  of  at  least  $300 
per  annum  for  each  to  live.  This  amounts  to  $30,000,000.  This  makes  a  total  of 
$50,000,000,  for  the  bare  outfit  and  provisions  for  one  year.  The  500  vessels  which  had 
arrived,  at  the  latest  date,  and  the  500  on  the  way,  are  worth,  on  an  average,  about 
$10,000  each,  which  amounts  to  $10,000,000.  The  time  of  each  individual  we  estimate 
to  be  worth,  on  an  average,  $200 — total,  $20,000,000.  Grand  total  of  outfit,  cost  of  living 
one  year,  cost  of  vessels  engaged  in  the  trade,  and  value  of  time  one  year,  $80,000,000. 
This  is  a  moderate  calculation,  as  the  actual  outlay  and  absorption  of  capital,  up  to  this 
time,  will  probably  amount  to  full  $100,000,000.  As  an  offset  to  this  we  have  thus  far 
received  about  six  millions  of  dollars  ($6,000,000)  in  gold  dust,  from  California  and  the 
whole  Pacific  coast.  It  will  be  perceived  that  there  is  still  an  enormous  balance  against 
California,  and  that  it  will  be  a  long  time,  at  the  rate  already  realized,  before  we  shall 
receive  even  the  sum  expetided,  to  say  nothing  about  profits.  It  is  our  impression  that 
most  of  those  engaged  in  the  trade  would  be  satisfied  with  merely  the  cost  of  their  ship 
ments.  Most  of  them  have  abandoned  all  idea  of  profits,  and  many  of  them  will  never 
realize  a  cent :  the  charges,  such  as  freight,  storage,  &c.,  will  eat  up  every  mill  of  first 
cost  The  only  product  of  California,  to  pay  for  this  immense  amount  of  property,  is  gold. 
At  present  it  has  no  other  resource,  and  we  know  of  none  but  its  minerals.  It  is  now  a 
little  more  than  twelve  months  since  the  emigration  to  California  commenced,  and  there 
has  never  been  known,  in  the  history  of  the  world,  such  a  movement  as  has  been  pre- 
sented in  this.  Independent  of  the  hundreds  of  vessels  which  have  departed  from  all 
parts  of  the  world  for  California,  we  have  nearly  a  dozen  of  the  finest  steamships  in  the 
world,  regularly  employed  in  carrying  passengers  and  the  mail  between  this  port  and 
San  Francisco,  via  Chagres  and  Panama.  Several  large  steamers  are  now  on  the  way 
round,  to  take  their  place  in  the  line  from  Panama  to  San  Francisco,  and  in  a  short  time 
we  shall  have  two  or  three  more  on  the  line  between  this  city  and  Chagres." 


148  THE    HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS. 

The  landowners  of  the  world  are  the  great  capitalists.  The  exchangers 
are  the  small  ones,  and  yet  they  and  their  machinery  absorb  the  chief  part 
of  the  products  of  the  land,  which  therefore  yields  but  small  return  to  the 
labour  employed  in  its  preparation  for  production.  Almost  everywhere 
throughout  this  country  it  is  of  small  value,  rarely  exceeding  the  cost  of 
fencing  and  buildings.  That  it  may  be  otherwise,  and  that  landowners  may- 
grow  rich,  it  is  required  that  they  bring  the  loom  to  the  cotton,  and  the  anvil 
to  the  food,  instead  of  sending  the  mass  of  cotton  and  food,  year  after  year, 
in  search  of  the  loom  and  the  anvil. 

How  rapidly  their  capital  is  capable  of  accumulating  is  a  lesson  that  the 
mass  of  the  farmers  and  planters  of  the  Union  have  yet  to  learn.  The  first 
settlement  of  land  involves  a  large  amount  of  labour;  but  here,  as  in  many 
other  cases,  it  is  the  first  step  that  is  the  most  costly.  The  land  cleared, 
the  farm  enclosed,  the  house  built,  and  the  road  made,  the  cost  of  transporta- 
tion still  absorbs  so  large  a  portion  of  the  product  that  the  whole  has  little 
value.  The  making  of  a  railroad  doubles  it,  but  the  quantity  of  cloth  or 
iron  that  can  be  obtained  for  wheat  or  cotton  is  yet  so  small  that  the  land 
has  still  but  little  value.  To  bring  the  furnace  or  the  cotton  mill  to  the  spot, 
and  thus  to  make  a  market  on  the  land  for  the  products  of  the  land,  requires 
an  amount  of  labour  that  is  absolutely  insignificant  compared  with  the 
amount  already  expended,  and  yet  it  doubles  the  value  of  all  around.  The 
sole  cause  of  the  difference  in  the  value  of  land  anywhere— quality  being 
equal — is  to  be  found  in  the  proximity  to,-  or  distance  from,  market. 

Let  us  now  suppose  that  during  the  last  twenty  years  we  had  annually 
appropriated  a  small  part  of  the  labour  that  has  been  wasted  on  the  road, 
and  a  small  portion  of  the,  food  and  cotton  that  have  been  lost  in  distant  mar- 
kets, to  the  building  of  furnaces  and  the  erection  of  cotton  mills,  and  that 
the  Southern  States  now  possessed  a  hundred  of  the  former,  each  capable 
of  producing  5000  tons  of  iron,  and  rolling  mills  to  convert  it  into  bars,  and 
the  latter  capable  of  converting  into  cloth  500,000  bales  of  cotton,  and  that 
the  spare  labour  of  their  hands  had  been  employed  in  grading  roads  upon 
which  they  had  been  for  years  laying  the  bars  produced  in  their  own  fur- 
naces and  mills,  and  see  what  would  be  the  result.  Throughout  the  whole 
South  there  would  have  been  a  market  at  hand  for  a  large  portion  of  their 
products,  while  every  part  would  be  enjoying  facilities  for  transporting  its 
surplus  food  or  cotton  to  distant  markets  at  one-fifth  of  the  present  cost,  and 
thus  the  land  of  every  part  would  have  been  acquiring  value,  to  an  extent 
almost  incalculable.  The  planting  States  have  400,000,000  of  acres,  and 
the  addition  of  ten  dollars  an  acre  to  the  present  value  would  amount  to 
four  thousand  millions  of  dollars,  while  the  cost  of  building  furnaces,  rolling- 
mills,  and  all  other  of  the  machinery  necessary  to  have  covered  those  States 
with  roads,  and  filled  them  with  machinery  to  enable  them  to  convert  into 
cloth  as  much  cotton  as  would  free  them  from  all  dependence  on  the  move- 
ments of  distant  markets,  making  them  independent,  would  not  have  been 
fifty  millions,  and  yet,  large  as  it  may  seem,  the  return  would  have  been  an 
augmentation  of  capital  counting  by  thousands  of  millions. 

An  addition  of  one  dollar  an  acre  in  the  annual  value,  or  rent,  of  a  plan- 
tation, would  add  more  than  ten  dollars  an  acre  to  its  value.  The  farmer 
now  sends  his  corn  to  market  and  brings  back  twenty  cents,  yet  the  con- 
sumer pays  fifty.  He  brings  back  iron  that  costs  him  300  bushels  per  ton, 
yet  the  producer  of  that  iron  obtains  but  25.  Had  the  iron  and  cotton 
manufactures  been  allowed  to  develope  themselves  throughout  Virginia, 
Tennessee,  Alabama,  and  other  of  the  Southern  States,  60  bushels  of  corn, 
or  half  a  bale  of  cotton,  would  this  day  pay  for  a  ton  of  iron,  and  if  that  were 
the  case,  what  would  now  be  the  value  of  land?  Would  it  not  be  greater 


THE   HARMONY    OF    INTERESTS.  149 

than  at  present  by  more  than  twenty  dollars  an  acre?  If  so,  would  not  that 
amount  to  eight  thousand  millions  of  dollars  ?  It  is  almost  inconceivable 
how  trivial  is  the  amount  of  capital  required  to  double,  treble,  or  quadruple 
the  value  of  land,  after  the  first  and  most  expensive  process,  that  of  the  first 
occupation,  has  been  performed. 

Let  us  now  look  to  the  state  of  things  in  England.  The  great  field  of 
employment  for  capital  is  the  land.  The  number  of  acres  in  the  United 
Kingdom  is  sixty-four  millions.  An  expenditure  of  labour  to  the  extent  of 
only  twenty  shillings  per  acre  would  absorb  the  enormous  sum  of  three 
hundred  millions  of  dollars,  and  an  average  of  three  guineas  per  acre  would 
absorb  one  thousand  millions  ;  whereas  the  whole  capital  employed  in  the 
cotton  manufacture  is  but  thirty-four  millions  of  pounds,*  or  about  one  hun- 
dred and  sixty  millions  of  dollars,  and  that  invested  in  shipping  is  but  little 
more.  Now,  if  we  suppose  one-half  of  the  cotton  machinery  to  be  for 
the  domestic  trade,  and  the  other  half  for  the  foreign,  and  one-half  of  the 
navigation  to  be  for  home  purposes,  including  the  procuring  of  tea,  coffee, 
sugar,  silk,  &c.,  for  the  home  market — and  the  other  half  to  be  for  other 
purposes,  the  result  will  be  that  the  market  for  capital  provided  by  the  fo- 
reign trade  is  but  one-sixth  of  what  would  be  required  for  agriculture,  at 
only  three  pounds  per  acre.  If  we  take  the  average  duration  of  ships  and 
machinery  to  be  ten  years,  we  have  an  annual  demand  by  the  foreign  trade 
for  three  millions  only,  being  equal  to  less  than  one  shilling  per  acre  an- 
nually invested  in  the  improvement  of  land.  No  one  who  is  familiar  with 
the  condition  of  Irish  agriculture,  and  of  a  large  portion  of  that  of  Eng- 
land and  Scotland,  can  doubt  that  the  expenditure  of  twenty  times  that  amount 
in  the  gradual  improvement  of  cultivation,  and  in  the  improvement  of  com- 
munications would  be  attended  with  a  large  return.  Land,  however,  is 
everywhere  centralized  in  the  hands  of  great  owners,  and  cultivated  by 
great  farmers ;  arid  the  consequence  is,  that  capital  does  not  find  employ- 
ment in  its  improvement,  and  has  to  seek  a  vent  in  manufactures  and  com- 
merce, which,  together,  afford  a  field  so  small,  that  competition  is  great 
and  the  rate  of  profit  is  very  low. 

The  savings  of  Ireland  are  forced  into  England,  because  of  the  absence 
of  all  modes  of  local  investment.  From  1821  to  1833,  no  less  than  ten 
millions  of  pounds  were  thus  transferred;  and  later  statements  show  that  the 
course  of  events  from  that  time  to  the  present  has  been  nearly  the  same. 

Of  the  deposits  in  the  Scottish  banks,  a  large  portion  is  habitually  invested 
in  the  funds;  and  thus,  local  investment  being  prevented,  there  is  a  constant 
pressure  upon  the  centre,  which  deprives  the  capitalists,  great  and  small,  of 
remuneration. 

The  natural  consequence  of  this  absence  of  facilities  for  applying  capital 
at  the  places  at  which  it  is  owned,  is  the  accumulation  of  large  quantities 
in  London,  for  which  a  market  is  to  be  sought  at  low  rates  of  interest. 
Foreigners  are  then  invited  to  borrow  money — that  is  to  say,  to  buy  cloth 
and  iron  on  credit — and  then  when  by  this  process  the  unemployed  capital 
has  been  scattered  to  different  parts  of  the  earth,  there  comes  a  crisis, 
and  the  debts  are  called  in,  with  bankruptcy  to  the  debtors  of  England, 
and  wide-spread  ruin  among  the  merchants  of  England.  Such  is  the  his- 
tory of  the  period  from  1835  to  1842,  ending  in  bankruptcy  and  repudia- 
tion. Such  is  the  history,  so  far,  of  the  tariff  of  '46.  We  have  bought 
from  thirty  to  forty  millions  of  dollars  of  goods  on  credit,  and  the  day  of 
payment  must  come. 

By  a  succession  of  operations  of  this  kind  all  the  customers  of  England 

•  McCulloch's  Statistics,  Vol.  I.  p.  78. 


150  THE    HARMONY    OF   INTERESTS. 

had  been  ruined,  and  there  remained,  in  1842,  no  foreign  country  that  could 

be  trusted.     Capital  appeared  superabundant.     Interest  was  very  low,  and 

there  appeared  no  prospect  of  improvement.     Every  thing  was  prepared  for 

a  great  home  speculation,  and  the  railroad  soon  became  the  hobby  of  the  day. 

It  was  a  great  lottery,  in  which  peers  and  paupers,  bankers  and  half-pay 

officers,  clergymen  and  pickpockets,  bought  tickets,  all  certain  of  drawing 

prizes.     Five  thousand  miles  of  road  have  been  made,  at  a  nominal  cost  of 

£148,000,000,*  but  the  larger  portion  of  this  vast  sum  has  been  merely  a 

transfer  from  the  pocket  of  one  gambler  into  that  of  another,  as  may  be  seen 

from  the  following  statement.     The  mere  Parliamentary  expenses!  of  the 

Blackwall  railway  amounted  to,  .         .         .        per  mile,  $70,000 

Those  of  the  Manchester  and  Birmingham  to        .         .      "          25,000 

And  those  of  the  Eastern  Counties'  road  to  "          23,000 

The  amount  allowed  for  land  by  the  Manchester  and 

Birmingham,  was  .         .         .         .         .         .        .      "          80,000 

Eastern  counties "  75,000 

In  this  manner,  the  cost  of  the  works  executed  was  swelled  to  $250,000, 
$300,000,  $400,000,  and  in  one  case  to  $1,400,000  per  rnile,  the  conse- 
quence of  which  has  been  that  while  the  designing  few  have  been  enriched, 
the  many  have  been  ruined,  and  England  is  covered  with  the  wrecks  of  this 
disastrous  speculation,  which  owed  its  existence  to  the  fact  that  the  whole 
policy  of  the  country  tended  to  force  capital  into  commerce  and  manufactures, 
which  afford  the  smallest  field  for  its  employment,  and  to  drive  it  from  agri- 
culture, the  only  one  that  affords  a  field  constantly  enlarging,  and  in  which 
an  almost  unlimited  amount  of  labour  and  capital  might  be  employed  at  a 
constantly  increasing  rate  of  return. 

The  manner  in  which  the  system  operates  upon  the  moneyed  capitalist  here 
is  nowto  be  examined.  In  1835,  as  we  have  seen, the  natural  outlets  for  capital 
were  closed.  We  ceased  to  build  mills,  furnaces,  or  rolling-mills,  and  the 
building  of  ships  and  houses  was  diminished.  The  necessary  consequence 
of  this  blocking  up  of  capital  was,  that  the  price  of  dividend-paying  stocks 
rose,  and  this  produced  a  desire  to  create  new  stocks  with  the  then  idle  ca» 
pital.  Roads  and  canals  were  commenced  at  the  west  and  south-west,  banks 
were  created,  and  the  capitalist  was  led  to  believe  that  he  was  to  obtain  ten 
or  fifteen  per  cent,  per  annum  for  the  use  of  the  means  that  he  thus  placed 
under  the  control  of  strangers.  The  day  of  settlement,  however,  arrived. 
England  claimed  payment  for  the  cloth  and  iron ;  but  the  means  by  which 
she  might  have  been  paid  were  scattered  to  the  four  winds  of  heaven, 
invested  in  unproductive  roads,  and  in  banks  that  were  ruined  by  the  failure 
of  their  debtors  ;  and  thus  were  wasted  as  many  millions  as  mould  have 
built  furnaces  to  produce  quadruple  the  iron  we  ever  yet  have  used,  and  con- 
verted into  cloth  all  of  the  cotton  we  then  produced.  The  mass  of  smaller 
capitalists  were  ruined,  but  the  few  were  made  rich. 

We  are  now  moving  in  the  same  direction.  Money  is  said  to  be  cheap  ; 
that  is,  there  is  much  in  bank  at  the  credit  of  depositors,  for  which  they  are 
receiving  no  interest.  The  papers  of  the  day  informs  us  that  Western  city 
stocks  and  bonds  are  coming  into  demand;  and  here  we  have  the  beginning 
of  a  movement  similar  to  that  of  1836.  In  a  little  time  it  will  be  judged 
expedient  to  create  banks  at  a  distance,  and  then  a  little  while  and  England 
will  claim  payment  for  the  cloth  and  iron  we  are  now  buying  on  credit,  and 
then  will  be  re-enacted  the  scenes  of  1842. 

•  Herapath's  Railway  Journal,  quoted  in  North  British  Review,  August,  1849. 
fThe  Parliamentary  expenses  of  1845,  '6,  and '7,  were  upwards  of  £10,000,000,  01 
$50,000,000._/Wd. 


THE   HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS.  151 

If  \ve  desire  to  know  who  are  the  persons  from  whom  is  derived  the 
power  thus  to  derange  the  movements  of  the  world,  it  is  needed  only  to  look 
at  the  prices  of  cotton  and  yarn  between  the  periods  of  1844  and  1848,  as 
shown  in  a  former  chapter.  The  farmers  and  planters  of  the  world  first 
give  away  their  products,  then  borrow  a  part  of  them  in  the  forms  of  cloth 
and  iron,  and  when  ruined  by  the  operation  are  denounced  as  bankrupts 
and  swindlers. 

The  well-understood  interests  of  the  capitalists  of  all  nations  are  in  perfect 
harmony  with  each  other.  Whatever  tends  to  diminish  production  in  one, 
tends  to  diminish  the  return  to  capital  in  all.  The  British  system  is  "a  war 
upon  the  labour  and  capital  of  the  world ;"  upon  her  own  as  well  as  that 
of  other  nations.  Its  effect  is  to  keep  the  return  to  the  capitalist  at  a  very 
low  point,  and  often  to  deprive  him  altogether  of  return,  and  all  because  it 
tends  to  compel  the  labourer  to  underwork  the  Hindoo  and  the  Russian,  and 
to  sink  him  to  their  level.  Therefore  it  is  that  labourers  and  capitalists  of 
other  nations  are  forced  to  resort  to  measures  of  protection.  The  immediate 
effect  of  the  adoption  of  efficient  and  complete  protection,  as  a  national  mea- 
sure, would  be  the  transfer  to  this  country  of  an  immense  body  of  capital 
in  the  form  of  machinery,  followed  by  a  gradual  rise  in  the  rate  of  profit  abroad, 
which  would  tend  to  attain  a  level  with  our  own.  ,  That  capital,  once  here, 
could  not  be  reclaimed.  Like  the  men  we  import,  it  would  stay,  and  the 
effect  that  would  follow  necessarily  from  its  transfer  would  be  an  increased 
import  of  men — of  all,  the  most  valuable  species  of  capital,  though  now,  in 
Europe,  the  most  despised. 

To  attain  perfect  freedom  of  trade,  we  need  to  raise  the  labourers  and 
capitalists  of  Europe  to  a  level  with  our  own.  The  colonial  system  tends 
to  depress  and  destroy  both. 

CHAPTER  FIFTEENTH. 
HOW  PROTECTION   AFFECTS   THE   LABOURER. 

WHENEVER  there  is  in  market  a  surplus  of  any  commodity,  whether  tha^ 
surplus  be  the  effect  of  natural  or  artificial  causes,  tbe  price  of  the  whole 
tends  to  fall  to  that  at  which  the  last  portion  can  be  sold — and  whenever 
there  is  a  deficiency,  the  price  of  the  whole  tends  to  rise  to  that  point  at 
which  the  last  portion  that  is  needed  can  be  obtained.  Labour  is  a  com- 
modity, the  owners  of  which  seek  to  exchange  with  other  persons,  giving  it 
in  the  form  of  sugar  or  cotton,  and  receiving  it  in  the  form  of  cloth  and  iron, 
and,  being  such,  it  is  subject  to  the  same  laws  as  all  other  commodities.  So 
long  as  there  shall  be  a  surplus  of  it  anywhere,  the  price  everywhere  tends  to 
fall  to  the  lowest  level.  With  the  diminution  of  the  surplus  anywhere,  the 
price  everywhere  will  tend  to  rise  to  a  level  with  the  'highest. 

Mere  labour,  unaided  by  machinery,  can  effect  little.  The  man  who  has 
no  axe  cannot  fell  a  tree,  nor  can  he  who  has  no  spade  dig  the  earth.  The 
man  who  has  no  reaping-hook  must  pull  up  the  grain,  and  he  who  has  no 
horse  or  cart  must  transport  his  load  upon  his  back.  Such  is  the  condition 
of  the  people  of  India,  and  such,  nearly,  is  that  of  the  people  of  Ireland. 
Labour  is  consequently  unproductive,  and  its  price  is  low. 

To  render  labour  productive,  men  require  machinery,  which  is  of  three 
kinds,  to  wit :  First,  Machinery  of  production,  consisting  of  lands  that  are 
cleared,  drained,  and  otherwise  fitted  for  the  work  of  cultivation.  Second, 
Machinery  of  conversion,  as  saw-mills,  which  convert  logs  into  planks  and 
boards ;  grist-mills,  which  convert  wheat  into  flour ;  cotton  and  woollen- 
mills,  which  convert  wool  into  cloth ;  and  furnaces,  which  convert  lime,  fuel, 
and  ore  into  iron.  Third,  Machinery  of  transportation,  by  aid  of  which  the 


152  THE   HARMjONY  OF   INTERESTS. 

man  who  raises  food  is  enabled  to  place  it  where  he  can  exchange  it  with  the 
one  who  makes  cloth  or  iron. 

The  two  latter  descriptions  make  no  addition  to  the  quantity  of  food  or 
wool  that  is  to  be  consumed.  The  wheat  or  cotton  that  goes  Into  the  mill 
comes  out  flour  or  cloth.  The  barrel  of  flour  that  goes  into  the  ship  comes 
out  a  barrel  of  flour,  neither  more  nor  less,  and  it  will  feed  no  more  people 
when  it  comes  out  than  when  it  went  in. 

The  bushel  of  wheat  that  is  sown  comes  out  of  the  earth  six,  eight,  or  ten 
bushels,  and  the  bushel  of  potatoes  comes  out  twenty  or  thirty  bushels. 
They  have  been  placed  in  the  machine  of  production,  while  the  others  have 
been  placed  in  the  machines  of  conversion  or  transportation. 

The  more  labour  that  can  be  applied  to  the  machine  of  production,  the 
larger  will  be  the  supply  of  food  and  wool,  and  the  larger  will  be  the  quan- 
tity of  both  that  will  be  deemed  the  equivalent  of  a  day's  labour. 

The  nearer  the  place  of  conversion  can  be  brought  to  the  place  of  pro- 
duction, the  less  will  be  the  necessity  for  transportation,  the  more  steady  will 
be  the  demand  for  labour  throughout  the  year,  the  larger  will  be  the  quantity 
that  may  be  given  to  the  work  of  production,  the  better  will  the  labourer  be 
fed  and  clothed,  and  the  more  rapid  will  be  the  accumulation  of  wealth  in 
the  form  of  machinery  to  be  used  in  the  further  increase  of  production. 

Wealth  tends  to  grow  more  rapidly  than  population,  because  better  soils 
are  brought  into  cultivation ;  and  it  does  grow  more  rapidly  whenever  people 
abandon  swords  and  muskets  and  take  to  spades  and  ploughs.  Every  increase 
in  the  ratio  of  wealth  to  population  is  attended  with  an  increase  in  the  power 
of  the  labourer  as  compared  with  that  of  landed  or  other  capital.  We  all  see 
that  when  ships  are  more  abundant  than  passengers,  the  price  of  passage  is 
low — and  that  when,  on  the  contrary,  passengers  are  more  abundant  than  ships, 
the  price  is  high.  When  ploughs  and  horses  are  more  plenty  than  plough- 
men, the  latter  fix  the  wages,  but  when  ploughmen  are  more  abundant  than 
ploughs,  the  owners  of  the  latter  determine  the  distribution  of  the  product  of 
labour.  When  wealth  increases  rapidly,  new  soils  are  brought  into  cultiva- 
tion, and  more  ploughmen  are  wanted.  The  demand  for  ploughs  produces  a 
demand  for  more  men  to  mine  coal  and  smelt  iron  ore,  and  the  iron-master 
becomes  a  competitor  for  the  employment  of  the  labourer,  who  obtains  a 
larger  proportion  of  the  constantly  increasing  return  to  labour.  He  wants 
clothes  in  greater  abundance,  and  the  manufacturer  becomes  a  competitor 
with  the  iron-master  and  the  farmer  for  his  services.  His  proportion  is  again 
increased,  and  he  wants  sugar,  and  tea,  and  coffee,  and  now  the  ship-master 
competes  with  the  manufacturer,  the  iron-master  and  the  farmer;  and  thus 
with  the  growth  of  population  and  wealth  there  is  produced  a  constantly  in- 
creasing demand  for  labour,  and  its  increased  productiveness,  and  the  con- 
sequently increased  facility  of  accumulating  wealth  are  followed  necessarily 
and  certainly  by  an  increase  of  the  labourer's  proportion.  His  wages  rise, 
and  the  proportion  of  the  capitalist  falls,  yet  now  the  latter  accumulates 
fortune  more  rapidly  than  ever,  and  thus  his  interest  and  that  of  the  labourer 
are  in  perfect  harmony  with  each  other.  If  we  desire  evidence  of  this,  it  is 
shown  in  the  constantly  increasing  amount  of  the  rental  of  England,  derived 
from  the  appropriation  of  a  constantly  decreasing  proportion  of  the  product 
of  the  land  :  and  in  the  enormous  amount  of  railroad  tolls  compared  with 
those  of  the  turnpike :  yet  the  railroad  transports  the  farmer's  wheat  ta 
market,  and  brings  back  sugar  and  coffee,  taking  not  one-fourth  as  large  a 
'proportion  for  doing  the  business  as  was  claimed  by  the  owner  of  the  wagon 
and  horses,  and  him  of  the  turnpike.  The  labourer's  product  is  increased, 
and  the  proportion  that  goes  to  the  capitalist  is  decreased.  The  power  of  the 
first  over  the  product  of  his  labour  has  grown,  while  that  of  the  latter  has 
diminished. 


THE   HARMOXY   OF   INTERESTS.  153 


Look  where  we  may,  throughout  this  country,  we  shall  find  that  where 
machinery  of  transportation  is  most  needed,  the  quantity  of  labour  that  can  be 
given  to  production  is  least,  and  the  return  to  labour — or  wages  of  the 
labourer  in  food,  clothing,  and  other  of  the  necessaries  and  comforts  of  life — 
is  least :  and  that  where  transportation  is  least  needed,  the  quantity  of 
labour  that  can  be  given  to  production  is  greatest,  and  wages  are  highest :  or  in 
other  words,  that  the  nearer  the  consumer  and  the  producer  can  be  brought 
together  the  larger  is  the  return  to  labour. 

For  forty  years  past  the  cultivation  of  cotton  in  India  has  been  gradually 
receding  from  the  lower  lands  towards  the  hills,  producing  a  constantly  in- 
creasing necessity  for  the  means  of  transportation,  and  a  constant  diminution 
in  the  quantity  of  labour  that  could  be  applied  to  production.  With  each 
such  step  labour  has  been  becoming  more  and  more  surplus,  and  the  reward 
of  labour  has  been  steadily  diminishing. 

During  a  large  portion  of  this  period,  such  has  been  the  case  with  Southern 
labour.  It  has  been  gradually  receding  from  the  lower  lands  of  South  Carolina 
and  Georgia,  producing  a  constant  increase  in  the  necessity  for  transportation, 
while  the  commodities  to  be  transported  would  command  in  return  a  con- 
stantly  decreasing  measure  of  cloth,  iron,  and  other  of  the  necessaries  of  life. 
This  tendency  has  been  in  some  degree  arrested  by  the  large  consumption  at 
home,  and  by  the  power  of  applying  labour  to  the  culture  of  sugar ;  but  were 
we  now  to  change  our  revenue  system,  establishing  perfect  freedom  of  trade, 
the  home  manufacture  of  cotton  and  the  home  production  of  sugar  must 
cease,  and  cotton  wool  would  then  fall  to  three  cents  per  pound,  for  the 
planter  would  then  be  reduced  to  that  as  the  only  thing  he  could  cultivate  for 
sale.  Labour  would  become  more  and  more  surplus,  with  a  constant  diminu- 
tion of  the  power  of  the  labourer  to  obtain  either  cloth  or  iron. 

So  has  it  been,  and  so  must  it  continue  to  be,  with  the  sugar  and  coffee 
planters.  Their  products  yield  them  a  constantly  diminishing  quantity  of 
either  cloth  or  iron,  with  constantly  increasing  difficulty  of  obtaining  clothing 
or  machinery  in  exchange  for  labour. 

In  New  England,  wages — i.  e.  the  power  to  obtain  food,  clothing,  and  iron 
in  exchange  for  labour — are  high,  but  they  tend  to  rise  with  every  increase 
in  the  productiveness  of  Southern  and  Western  labour,  and  so  will  they  con- 
tinue to  do  as  Southern  and  Western  men  become  manufacturers,  because 
the  latter  will  then  have  more  to  offer  in  exchange  for  labour.  With  any 
diminution  in  the  productiveness  of  labour  South  or  West,  the  wages  of  New 
England  must  fall,  because  there  will  then  be  less  to  offer  them  in  exchange. 

In  England,  the  power  to  obtain  food,  clothing,  or  iron,  for  labour,  is 
small,  and  it  tends  to  diminish  with  every  increase  in  the  proportion  of  the 
population  dependent  upon  transportation,  and  every  diminution  in  the  pro- 
portion that  applies  itself  to  production,  because  with  each  such  step  there  is 
a  necessity  for  greater  exertion  to  underwork  and  supplant  the  Hindoo, 
whose  annual  wages  even  now  are  but  six  dollars,  out  of  which  he  finds  him- 
self in  food  and  clothing.  With  every  step  downwards,  labour  is  more  and 
more  becoming  surplus,  as  is  seen  from  the  growing  anxiety  to  expel  popula- 
tion, at  almost  any  present  sacrifice.  Why  it  is  so  we  may  now  inquire. 

The  great  object  of  England  is  commerce. 

Commerce  among  men  tends  to  produce  equality  of  condition,  moral  and 
physical.  Whether  it  shall  tend  to  raise  or  to  depress  the  standard  of  con- 
dition, must  depend  upon  the  character  of  those  w.'th  whom  it  is  necessary 
that  it  should  be  maintained.  The  man  who  is  compelled  to  associate  with 
the  idle,  the  dissolute,  and  the  drunken,  is  likely  to  sink  to  the  level  of  his 
eompanions. 

So  is  it  with  labour.     The  necessity  for  depending  on  commerce  with  men 


154  THE   HARMONY  OF   INTERESTS 


among  whom  the  standard  is  low,  tends  to  sink  the  labourer  to  the  level  of 
the  lowest.  Place  half  a  dozen  men  on  an  island,  two  of  whom  are  indus- 
trious and  raise  food,  leaving  it  to  the  others,  less  disposed  to  work,  to  provide 
meat,  fish,  clothing,  and  shelter,  and  the  industrious  will  be  compelled  to  ex- 
change with  the  idle.  Clothing  and  shelter  are  as  necessary  as  bread,  and  those 
who  play  will  therefore  profit  by  the  labours  of  those  who  work.  The  latter, 
finding  such  to  be  the  result,  will  cease  to  work  with  spirit,  and  by  degrees 
all  the  members  of  the  little  community  will  become  equally  idle.  Here  lies 
the  error  of  communism  and  socialism.  They  seek  to  compel  union,  and  to 
force  men  to  exchange  with  each  other,  the  necessary  effect  of  which  is  to 
sink  the  whole  body  to  the  level  of  those  who  are  at  the  bottom. 

So,  too,  is  it  with  nations.  The  industrious  community  that  raises  food 
and  is  dependent  on  the  idle  one  that  makes  iron  must  give  much  of  the  one 
for  little  of  the  other.  The  peaceful  community  that  raises  cotton  and  is  de- 
pendent on  the  warlike  one  that  raises  silk,  must  give  much  cotton  for  little 
silk.  Dependence  on  others  for  articles  of  necessity  thus  makes  a  community 
of  goods,  and  the  sober  and  industrious  must  help  to  support  the  idle  and  the 
dissolute — nations  as  well  as  individuals. 

So  long  as  this  state  of  dependence  exists,  the  condition  of  each  is  deter- 
mined by  that  of  the  other.  If  the  idle  become  more  idle,  and  the  dissolute 
more  dissolute,  those  who  still  continue  to  work  must  steadily  give  more 
labour  for  less  labour,  and  their  condition  must  deteriorate  unless  they  adopt 
such  measures  as  shall  gradually  diminish  and  finally  terminate  their  de- 
pendence on  such  companions. 

The  policy  of  England  has  tended  to  produce  communism  among  nations. 
She  has  rendered  herself  dependent  upon  other  communities  for  supplies  of 
the  articles  of  prime  necessity,  food  and  clothing,  obtaining  her  rice  from  the 
wretched  Hindoo,  her  corn  from  the  Russian  serf,  and  her  wool  from  the 
Australian  convict,  neglecting  her  own  rich  soils  that  wait  but  the  application 
of  labour  to  become  productive. 

The  necessary  consequence  of  this  is  a  tendency  downwards  in  the  con- 
dition of  her  people,  and  as  it  is  with  those  of  England  that  those  of  this 
country  are  invited  to  compete,  it  may  not  be  amiss  to  show  what  is  the  con- 
dition to  which  they  are  now  reduced  by  competition  with  the  low-priced 
labour  of  Russia  and  of  India. 

The  Spectator,  a  free-trade  journal,  informs  us*  that  "  the  condition  of  the 
labouring  classes  engaged  in  agriculture,  long  an  opprobrium  to  our  advance 
ment  in  civilization,  has  not  improved ;  while  wages  exhibit  a  universal  ten- 
dency to  decline  beneath  the  lowest  level  of  recent  times." 

The  Morning  Chronicle  has  recently  given  a  series  of  letters  from  a  cor- 
respondent specially  deputed  to  inquire  into  the  condition  of  the  labouring 
classes  in  the  agricultural  counties,  and  by  him  we  are  informed  that  in 
Buckinghamshire  and  Oxfordshire  the  average  wages  of  the  year  will  not 
exceed  9/=$2'16  per  week,  while  in  Berks  and  Wiltshire  they  will  not 
exceed  7/6  =  81-79,  and  with  this  it  is  to  be  borne  in  mind  that  "when  a 
poor  wretch  is  prevented  for  a  day,  or  even  half  a  day,  from  working,  his 
wages  are  stopped  for  the  time."  The  wife  sometimes  works  in  the  fields,  and 
adds  three  shillings  a  week  to  the  fund  out  of  which  these  unfortunate  people 
are  to  be  subsisted,  yet  this  gain  is  not  without  a  drawback,  as  will  be  seen 
by  those  who  may  read  the  following  account  of  the  condition  of  the  English 
agricultural  labourer,  in  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth  century,  which,  long  as 
it  is,  will  be  found  interesting  :— 


November  12,  1848. 


THE   HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS.  155 

"When  a  married  woman  goes  to  the  fields  to  work,  she  must  leave  her  children  at 
home.  In  many  cases  they  are  too  young  to  be  left  by  themselves,  when  they  are 
generally  left  in  charge  of  a  young  girl  hired  for  the  purpose.  The  sum  paid  to  this 
vicarious  mother,  who  is  generally  herself  a  mere  child,  is  from  8rf.  to  1*.  per  week,  in 
addition  to  which  she  is  fed  and  lodged  in  the  house.  This  is  nearly  equivalent  to  an 
addition  of  two  more  mem  Hers  to  the  family.  If,  therefore,  the  mother  works  in  the  fields 
for  weekly  wages  equal  to  the  maintenance  of  three  children  for  the  week,  it  is,  in  the 
first  place,  in  many  cases,  at  the  cost  of  having  two  additional  mouths  to  feed.  But  this 
is  far  from  being  all  the  disadvantages  attending  out-door  labour  by  the  mother.  One  o»" 
the  worst  features  attending  the  system  is  the  cheerlessness  with  which  it  invests  the 
poor  man's  house.  On  returning  from  work,  instead  of  finding  his  house  in  order  and  a 
meal  comfortably  prepared  for  him,  his  wife  accompanies  him  home,  or  perhaps  arrives 
after  him,  when  all  has  to  be  done  in  his  presence  which  should  have  been  done  for  his 
reception.  The  result  is,  that  home  is  made  distasteful  to  him,  and  he  hies  to  the  nearest 
ale-house,  where  he  soon  spends  the  balance  of  his  wife's  earnings  for  the  week,  and 
also  those  of  his  children,  if  any  of  them  have  been  at  work.  A  great  deal  is  lost  also 
through  the  unthrifty  habits  of  his  wife.  Her  expertness  at  o'.U-door  labour  has  been 
acquired  at  the  expense  of  an  adequate  knowledge  of  her  in-door  duties.  She  is  an  in- 
different cook — a  bad  housewife  in  every  respect.  She  is  also  in  numerous  instances 
lamentably  deficient  in  knowledge  of  the  most  ordinary  needle-work.  All  that  she  wants 
in  these  respects  she  might  acquire,  if  she  stayed  more  at  home  and  was  less  in  the  fields. 
In  addition  to  this,  her  children  would  have  the  benefit  of  being  brought  up  under  her 
own  eye,  instead  of  being,  as  they  are,  utterly  neglected  and  left  to  themselves ;  for  the 
party  left  in  charge  of  them — and  it  is  not  always  that  any  one  is  so— is  generally  herself 
a  child,  having  no  control  whatever  over  them.  It  is  under  these  circumstances  that  the 
seeds  of  future  vice  are  plentifully  sown.  On  the  whole,  as  regards  the  system  of  married 
women  working  in  the  fields,  I  cannot,  when  the  children  are  young,  but  look  on  the 
balance  as  being  on  the  side  of  disadvantage.  In  that  case  I  think  it  would  be  decidedly 
better  for  the  poor  man,  having  reference  only  to  his  physical  comforts,  that  his  wife 
stayed  at  home.  And  this  is  the  position  of  many  a  labouring  man.  In  many  cases 
when  the  family  is  large,  some  of  the  children  are  at  work,  adding  their  scanty  wages  of 
from  1«.  6d.  to  2s.  a  week  to  the  common  fund.  But  I  have  known  numerous  cas"es  of 
families  of  seven  children,  of  which  the  eldest  was  not  eight  years  old.  Besides,  when 
these  are  fit  to  work  and  earn  wages  of  their  own,  his  children  soon  become  independent 
of  him,  and  set  up  for  themselves.  This  is  in  one  way  a  relief  to  him,  unless  his  family, 
while  diminishing  at  one  end,  is  increasing  at  the  other.  There  can  be  no  doubt  but  that 
a  family  is  frequently  aided  by  the  earnings  of  the  children,  but  in  by  far  the  greater 
number  of  cases  the  means  of  support  are  procured  by  the  parents  themselves.  From 
what  has  been  already  said  of  the  disadvantage  to  the  whole  family  at  which  the  wife 
bears  her  share  in  procuring  them,  it  will  be  evident  that  the  husband's  earnings  are, 
after  all,  the  true  test  and  standard  of  his  own  condition  and  that  of  those  dependent  upon 
him. 

Moreover,  in  a  very  large  proportion  of  cases,  the  wife  remains  at  home,  attending  to 
duties  more  appropriate  to  her  sex  and  position,  in  which  case  there  is  no  other  aid  to  be 
had,  unless  it  be  the  trifling  and  fitful  earnings  of  one  or  two  of  the  children.  We  have 
seen  that,  in  the  counties  in  question,  there  are  about  40,000  married  couples,  who,  with 
their  children,  numbering  about  120,000,  depend  exclusively  upon  agricultural  labour  for 
support.  Of  the  40,000  mothers,  fully  one-half  stay  at  home,  some  being  compelled  to  do 
so  on  account  of  the  extreme  youth  of  their  children;  and  others,  save  when  their  fami- 
lies are  somewhat  advanced,  preferring  from  calculation  to  do  so,  as  being  the  best  mode 
of  turning  their  scanty  means  to  good  account.  This  may  be  taken  as  the  case  witn  half 
the  married  couples,  who,  with  their  families,  will  number  about  100,000  individuals. 
So  far,  therefore,  as  these  are  concerned,  the  children,  in  about  the  same  proportion  of 
families,  being  too  young  to  add  any  thing  to  the  common  stock,  there  is  nothing  else  to 
adopt  as  the  test  of  their  condition  and  ihe  standard  of  their  comforts  but  the  earnings  of 
the  husband.  Let  us  inquire,  therefore,  into  the  condition  of  a  family  thus  solely  de- 
pendent upon  such  wages  as  the  husband  has,  on  the  average,  received  during  the  past 
portion  of  the  current  year.  I  can  best  illustrate  that  condition  by  one  of  the  uumerous 
cases  which  came  under  my  consideration  in  Wiltshire.  The  labourer  in  that  case  had 
had  8«.  a  week,  but  he  was  then  only  in  receipt  of  7«.  He  had  seven  children,  the  eldes 
of  whom,  a  girl,  was  in  her  eighth  year.  Two  of  his  children  had  been  at  a  "  dunce's 
school ;"  but  they  were  not  then  attending  it,  simply  because  he  could  not  afford  the  4dL 
a  week  which  had  to  be  paid  for  their  education.  To  ascertain  how  far  he  was  really 


156  THE   HARMONY  OF   INTERESTS. 

incapable  in  this  respect,  I  requested  him  to  detail  to  me  the  economy  of  his  household  for 
a  week,  taking  his  earnings  at  8s.  The  following  is  the  substance  of  the  conversation, 
discarding,  for  the  reader's  sake,  the  portions  in  which  the  names  are  given. 

When  are  your  wages  paid  ? — On  Saturday  night,  but  often  only  once  a  fortnight. 

What  do  you  do  with  the  money  on  receiving  it  ? — I  first  lay  by  my  rent,  which  is  a 
shilling  a  week.  I  then  go  to  the  grocer's  and  lay  in  something  for  Sunday  and  the  rest 
of  the  week.  I  buy  a  little  tea,  of  which  I  get  two  ounces  for  6rf.  Sugar  is  cheap,  but  I 
cannot  afford  it.  We  sometimes  sweeten  the  tea  with  a  little  treacle,  but  generally  drink 
it  unsweetened. 

Do  you  purchase  any  butcher  meat? — Generally  for  a  Sunday  we  buy  a  bit  of  bacon. 

How  much? — It  is  seldom  that  I  can  afford  more  than  half  a  pound. 

Half  a  pound  among  nine  of  you  ? — Yes ;  it  is  but  a  mere  taste,  but  we  have  not  even 
that  the  rest  of  the  week.  It  costs  me  about  5d, 

Do  you  buy  your  bread,  or  make  it  at  home  ? — We  buy  it.  We  have  not  fire  enough  to 
make  it  at  home,  or  it  would  be  a  great  saving  to  us. 

Do  you  buy  a  quantity  at  once,  or  a  loaf  when  you  need  it  ? — We  buy  it  as  we  need  it. 

Have  you  a  garden  attached  to  your  cottage  ? — I  have  about  fifteen  poles,  for  which  I 
pay  1  $d.  a  pole.  It  is  less  than  the  eighth  of  an  acre. 

What  do  you  raise  from  it  ? — We  raise  some  potatoes  and  cabbages. 

Do  you  raise  a  sufficient  quantity  of  potatoes  to  serve  you  for  the  year  ? — No,  not  even 
if  they  were  all  sound. 

In  addition  to  the  potatoes  and  the  cabbages  which  you  raise,  how  much  bread  do  you 
require  for  your  own  support,  and  that  of  your  wife  and  seven  children  for  the  week  ? — 
We  require  seven  gallons  of  bread  at  least 

What  is  a  gallon  of  bread  ? — It  is  a  loaf  which  used  to  weigh  8  Ibs.  1 1  oz.,  but  which  now 
seldom  weighs  above  8  Ibs.  Those  who  supply  bread  to  the  union  seldom  make  it  over  8  Ibs. 

What  is  the  price  of  the  gallon  loaf? — Tenpence.  It  is  cheaper  than  it  was,  but  then 
there  is  not  always  so  much  of  it.  It  is  often  of  short  weight. 

Seven  gallons  of  bread  at  lOrf.  a  gallon  would  make  5a.  lOd.,  would  it  not? — I  believe 
it  would  make  about  that — you  ought  to  know. 

Do  you  always  get  seven  gallons  a  week  ? — No,  seldom  more  than  six. 

Then  you  spend  5s.  in  bread,  and  make  up  for  the  want  of  more  by  potatoes  and  cab- 
bages ? — Yes. 

You  have  still  some  money  left ;  what  do  you  do  with  it  ? — It  costs  us  something  for  wash- 
ing. For  soap  and  soda,  and  for  needles  and  thread  for  mending,  we  pay  about  5d.  a  week. 

Do  you  buy  fuel?— We  get  a  cwt.  of  coal  sometimes,  which  would  cost  us  about  1«.  or 
1*.  \$d.  if  we  took  in  any  quantity  and  paid  ready  money.  When  we  do  neither  it  costs 
us  about  1».  4rf.  a  cwt.  If  there  is  one  poor  man  who  can  afford  to  buy  it  in  any  quan- 
tity for  ready  money,  there  are  forty  who  cannot. 

How  long  would  a  cwt.  of  coals  serve  you  ? — We  make  it  last  one  way  or  another  for 
two  weeks. 

Your  fuel,  therefore,  will  cost  you  about  8rf.  a  week  ? — It  will. 

Is  there  any  thing  else  yon  have  ?— We  buy  a  little  salt  butler  sometimes,  which  we  can 
get  from  6 $d.  to  Wd.  a  pound.  We  are  obliged,  of  course,  to  take  the  cheapest ;  "  and 
really,  sir,  it  is  sometimes  not  hardly  fit  to  grease  a  wagon  with." 

But  your  money  is  already  all  gone :  how  do  you  pay  for  your  butter? — It  is  not  always 
that  we  have  it,  and  we  can  only  have  it  by  stinting  ourselves  in  other  things. 

You  have  said  nothing  about  your  clothing :  how  do  you  procure  that  ? — But  for  the 
high  wages  we  get  during  the  harvest  time,  we  could  not  get  it  at  all. 

How  long  does  the  time  last  when  you  get  high  wages? — About  ten  weeks,  and  but 
for  what  we  then  get  I  do  not  know  how  we  could  get  on  at  all. 

From  this  recapitulation  it  must  certainly  appear  a  mystery  to  the  reader  how  they  get 
on  as  it  is.  The  weekly  expenditure,  in  our  view,  is  as  follows,  the  family  being  nine 
•nd  the  wetkly  receipts  8s. : — 

«.   d. 

Rent 10 

Tea 0     6 

Bacon     ........         0     5 

Bread 50 

Soda,  soap,  &c 05 

Fuel 08 

Total        .  .  80 


THE   HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS.  157 

The  provision  for  clothing  is  in  the  extra  wages  paid  at  harvest  time,  while  the  family 
cannot  be  treated  to  the  luxury  of  bad  butter  without  sacrificing  the  tea,  two  ounces  of 
which'  must  serve  for  a  week,  the  half  pound  of  bacon,  which  affords  but  a  "  mere  taste" 
on  Sunday  to  each  ;  some  of  the  bread  which  is  already  but  too  scantily  supplied;  or  a 
portion  of  their  fuel,  the  absence  of  which  renders  their  home  still  more  cheerless  and 
desolate.  Sugar,  too,  is  out  of  the  question,  without  trenching  upon  items  more  absolutely 
necessary.  Nor  is  there  any  reserved  fund  for  medicines,  too  often  required  by  a  family 
of  nine  thus  miserably  circumstanced.  What,  in  short,  have  we  here  1  We  have  nine 
people  subsisting  for  seven  days  upon  60  Ibs.  of  bread — scarcely  a  pound  a  day  for  each, 
half  a  pound  of  bacon,  and  two  ounces  of  tea,  the  rest  being  made  up  by  a  provision,  too 
scanty  in  nine  cases  out  of  ten,  of  potatoes  and  cabbages  raised  in  the  garden.  Could 
they  descend  much  lower  in  the  scale  of  wretchedness,  especially  when  we  couple  with 
their  stinted  supply  of  the  less  nutritious  kinds  of  food  the  miserable  hovels  in  which  it 
h  taken  by  them,  either  shivering  in  the  winter's  frosts,  or  inhaling  the  pestilential  odours 
engendered  around  them  by  the  summer  heats? 

I  could  no  longer  express  any  surprise  at  4d.  a.  week  being  grudged  for  the  education 
of  two  children. 

This  being  the  mode  in  which  his  waekly  wages  were  expended,  I  asked  the  same 
individual  to  give  me  an  account  of  his  daily  life,  including  his  labour  and  fare.  In  reply 
to  my  questions  on  this  point  he  answered,  in  substance,  as  follows : — 

At  what  hour  do  you  go-to  work? — At  six  in  the  morning,  generally,  in  summer;  but  1 
have  gone  much  earlier.  In  winter  time  work  begins  at  a  later  hour. 

Do  you  breakfast  at  home  ? — When  I  do  not  go  out  very  early  I  generally  do. 

Of  what  does  your  breakfast  consist? — Principally  of  bread,  and  sometimes  a  little  tea. 
Sometimes,  too,  we  have  a  few  potatoes  boiled. 

When  do  you  dine? — About  twelve. 

Of  what  does  your  dinner  consist? — On  the  Monday  my  wife  gets  a  little  flour  and 
makes  a  pudding,  which,  with  a  few  potatoes,  forms  my  dinner.  Sometimes  we  have  a 
pudding  on  other  days,  but  generally  our  dinner  is  bread  and  potatoes,  with  now  and 
then  a  little  cabbage.  When  the  family  is  not  large,  there  may  be  a  bit  of  bacon  left  that 
has  not  been  ,used  on  Sunday,  but  that  is  never  the  case  with  us. 

You  return  to  work  again  ? — I  do,  and  when  I  come  home  at  night  may  have  a  little 
tea  again,  with  the  bread  which  forms  my  supper.  The  tea  is  never  strong  with  us,  but 
at  night  it  is  very  weak. 

Do  your  children  get  tea  ? — We  have  not  enough  for  that. 

What  is  their  drink  ? — Water ;  sometimes  we  get  them  a  little  milk. 

What  is  your  own  drink? — Water. 

Do  you  never  drink  beer? — Never,  but  when  it  is  given  me;  I  can't  afford  to  buy  it. 

When  your  dinner  consists  of  bread,  potatoes,  and  water,  have  you  nothing  to  season  it 
or  make  it  palatable  ? — Nothing  but  a  little  salt  butter ;  and  we  can  only  afford  that  when 
the  bread  or  potatoes  happen  not  to  be  very  good,  or  when  we  are  ailing,  and  our 
stomachs  are  a  little  dainty. 

When  your  bread  or  potatoes  are  bad,  or  your  stomachs  are  dainty,  you  take  as  a 
relish  the  butter  which  you  said  was  scarcely  fit  to  grease  a  wagon  with? — We  have 
nothing  better  to  take. 

Suppose  you  had  nothing  but  bread  to  eat,  how  much  would  you  require  to  sustain  you 
at  work  in  the  course  of  a  day  ? — Two  pounds  at  least. 

And  how  much  would  one  of  your  children  require  ?— About  the  same.  A  child, 
although  not  at  work,  will  eat  as  much  as  a  man;  children  are  always  growing,  and 
always  ready  to  eat,  and  one  does  not  like  to  refuse  food  to  them  when  they  want  it  I 
would  sooner  go  without  myself  than  stint  my  children,  if  I  could  help  it. 

Then,  at  the  rate  of  two  pounds  a  day  for  each,  you  would  require  for  ah  about  126  Ibs. 
for  the  week  ? — I  suppose  about  that. 

And,  as  you  only  get  about  sixty  pounds  of  bread  a  week,  you  have  to  rely  on  your 
potatoes  and  cabbages,  your  half  pound  of  bacon,  and  two  ounces  of  tea,  to  make  up  for 
the  sixty-six  pounds  which  you  cannot  get? — We  have  nothing  else  to  rely  on. 

Have  you  enough  of  these  to  afford  you  as  much  nourishment  as  there  would  be  in 
sixty-six  pounds  of  bread  ? — Not  nearly  enough. 

Is  what  you  have  stated  your  manner  of  living  from  week  to  week? — It  is  when  I 
have  work. 

And  when  you  have  not  work,  how  is  it  with  you  ? — In  the  winter  months  we  havs 
sometimes  scarcely  a  bit  to  put  in  our  mouths. 


158  THE   HARMONY  OF   INTERESTS. 

Such  is  the  substance  of  the  statement,  as  regards  his  own  and  his  family's  circum- 
stances, made  to  me  by  a  labouring  man  in  the  receipt  of  the  average  rate  of  wages  for 
the  last  nine  months  in  Wiltshire.  Comment  is  scarcely  needed,  the  facts  speaking  but 
too  plainly  for  themselves.  Had  the  family  been  smaller,  or-  the  wages  a  little  higher, 
instead  of  a  "taste,"'  they  might  have  had  a  meal  of  bacon  once  a  week.  But  even  then 
it  would  be  but  once  a  week,  potatoes  and  bread  still  constituting  the  staple  of  their  diet, 
and  even  these  not  being  had  by  them  in  sufficient  quantity.  Besides,  even  if  they  had 
it  more  frequently,  bacon  is  not  the  most  nourishing  food  in  the  shape  of  butcher  meat; 
it  is  fat,  and  goes  to  fat.  The  little  lean  that  is  in  it  is  almost  destroyed  by  the  process  of 
curing.  But  it  is  greasy,  and  soon  satisfies.  "It  fills  us  sooner  than  any  other  kind  of 
meat,"  was  the  reply  given  to  me  when  I  asked  why  they  preferred  it  to  beef?  But  the 
fault  is  that  it  does  not  fill  them ;  it  satiates,  without  filling  them.  Bulk  is  required  as 
well  as  nutriment  in  food.  The  stomach  has  a  mechanical  as  well  as  a  chemical  action 
to  perform.  A  man  could  not  live  on  cheese,  nor  could  he  exist  on  pills  having  in  them 
the.  concentrated  essence  of  beef.  They  buy  bacon  because  it  goes  a  longer  way  than 
other  meat — in  truth,  they  buy  it  because  it  soon  cloys  them.  Nor  is  it  always  that  they 
have  even  a  "taste"  of  it  once  a  week.  I  have  seen  several  families 'who  had  not  tasted 
butcher  meat  of  any  kind  for  weeks  at  a  time.  When  French  and  English  workmen 
came  together  during  the  construction  of  some  of  the  French  railways,  it  was  found  that 
the  Englishman  could  perform  far  more  work  than  his  French  competitor.  This  was 
universally  attributed  to  the  superiority  of  his  diet,  it  being  supposed  but  reasonable  on 
all  hands  to  expect  more  work  from  the  man  who  fed  on  beef  and  porter  than  from  him 
whose  fare  was  bread  and  grapes.  But  the  fare  of  the  man  who  is  expected  by  his 
labour  to  develope,  year  after  year,  the  agricultural  wealth  of  England,  is,  in  a  large  pro- 
portion of  cases,  little  better  than  bread  and  water — the  fare  of  the  condemned  cell ! 
Contrast  the  condition  of  the  English  farm  labourer  with  that  of  the  farm  labourer  in 
Canada.  In  England  he  eats  butcher-meat  once  a  week,  and  not  always  that;  in  Canada 
he  has  as  much  of  it  as  he  wants  once,  at  least,  and  frequently  twice  a  day.  Contrast  his 
conditior  even  with  that  of  the  slave  in  the  Southern  States  of  America.  In  Virginia,  the 
great  slave  State,  it  is  seldom  that  a  day  passes  without  the  slave  eating  butcher-meat  of 
some  kind  or  other.  In  addition  to  this,  when  he  is  old  and  infirm,  he  has  a  claim  on  his 
master  for  support  But  the  English  labourer,  if  he  has  a  family  to  sustain,  has  not,  even 
during  the  days  of  his  strength,  when  he  can  do,  and  does  work,  the  same  nutritious  diet 
as  the  slave ;  while,  when  he  is  disabled,  or  loses  his  work,  he  must  starve,  or,  as  the 
alternative,  become  a  vagrant,  or  the  recipient  of  a  formal  and  organized  charity.  In  the 
words  of  one  of  themselves,  "  it  is  not  a  living,  sir — it  is  a  mere  being  we  get ;"  by  which 
he  intended  to  convey  that  their  reward  for  their  toil  was  their  being  barely  enabled  to 
exist. 

It  may  be  said  that  the  case  put  is  an  extreme  one.  It  is  the  case,  however,  of  nearly 
one-half  of  those  who  are  dependent  upon  labour  in  the  fields.  But  it  may  be  said  that  I 
nave  omitted  to  take  into  account  some  little  privileges  which  the  labourer  has,  and 
which,  when  he  avails  himself  of  them,  tend  to  enhance  his  comforts.  He  may  keep  a 
pig,  for  instance,  and  his  employer  will  sometimes  find  him  straw  for  it,  which,  in  pro- 
cess of  time,  will  serve  as  manure  for  his  little  garden.  This  looks  very  well  on  paper, 
but  that  is  chiefly  all.  In  the  four  counties  under  consideration  the  number  of  labourers 
keeping  pigs  is  about  one  in  twelve.  It  is  also  a  striking  illustration  of  the  condition  of 
the  labourers,  that  even  such  of  them  as  do  feed  a  pig  seldom  participate  in  the  eating  of 
it.  Then  we  hear  a  great  deal  about  the  coal  and  clothing  clubs,  to  which  I  shall  here- 
after more  particularly  advert,  and  the  chief  merit  of  which  is  that  they  tend  to  rendei 
life  not  pleasant,  but  barely  toierable  to  the  poor." 

The  sleeping  accommodations  are  thus  described  : — 

"These  are  above,  and  are  gained  by  means  of  a  few  greasy  and  rickety  steps,  which 
lead  through  a  species  of  hatchway  in  the  ceiling.  Yes,  there  is  but  one  room,  and  yet 
we  counted  nine  in  the  family  !  And  such  a  room  !  The  small  window  in  the  roof 
admits  just  light  enough  to  enable  you  to  discern  its  character  and  dimensions.  The 
rafters,  which  are  all  exposed,  spring  from  the  very  floor,  so  that  it  is  only  in  the  very 
centre  of  the  apartment  that  you  have  any  chance  of  standing  erect.  The  thatch  oozes 
through  the  wood-work  which  supports  it,  the  whole  being  begrimed  with  smoke  and 
dust,  and  replete  with  vermin.  There  are  no  cobwebs,  for  the  spider  only  spreads  his 
net  where  flies  are  likely  to  be  caught.  You  look  in  vain  for  a  bedstead  ;  there  is  none 
in  the  room.  But  there  are  their  beds,  lying  side  by  side  on  the  floor,  almost  in  contact 


THE   HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS.  159 

wiih  each  other,  anr*  occupying  nearly  the  whole  length  of  the  apartment.  The  beds  are 
large  sacks,  filled  with  the  chaff  of  oats,  which  the  labourer  sometimes  gets  and  at  others 
purchases  from  liis  employer.  The  chaff  of  wheat  and  barley  is  used  on  the  farm  for 
other  purposes.  The  bed  next  the  hatchway  is  that  of  the  father  and  mother,  with  whom 
sleeps  the  infant,  born  but  a  few  months  ago  in  this  very  room.  In  the  other  beds  sleep 
the'children,  the  boys  and  girls  together.  The  eldest  girl  is  in  her  twelfth  year,  the  elde&t 
boy  having  nearly  completed  his  eleventh;  and  they  are  likely  to  remain  for  years  yet  in 
the  circumstances  in  which  we  now  find  them.  With  the  exception  of  the  youngest 
children,  the  family  retire  to  rest  about  the  same  hour,  generally  undressing  below,  and 
then  ascending  and  crawling  over  each  other  to  their  respective  resting-places  for  the 
night.  There  are  two  blankets  on  the  bed  occupied  by  the  parents,  the  others  being 
covered  with  a  very  heterogeneous  assemblage  of  materials.  It  not  unfrequently  happens 
that  the  clothes  worn  by  the  parents  in  the  day  time  form  the  chief  part  of  the  covering 
pf  the  children  by  night.  Such  is  the  dormitory  in  which,  lying  ride  by  side,  the  nine 
whom  we  have  just  leA  below  at  their  wretched  meal  will  pass  the  night.  The  sole 
ventilation  is  through  the  small  aperture  occupied  by  what  is  termed,  by  courtesy,  a  win- 
dow. In  other  words,  there  is  scarcely  any  ventilation  at  all.  What  a  den  in  the  hour 
of  sickness  or  death  !  What  a  den,  indeed,  at  any  time !  And  yet  when  the  sable  god- 
dess stretches  forth  her  leaden  sceptre  over  the  soft  downy  couch  in  Mayfair,  such  are 
the  circumstances  in  which,  in  our  rural  parishes,  she  leaves  a  portion  of  her  slumbering 
domain. 

Let  it  not  be  said  that  this  picture  is  overdrawn,  or  that  it  is  a  concentration,  for  effect, 
into  one  point,  of  effects  spread  in  reality  over  a  large  surface.  As  a  type  of  the  extreme 
of  domiciliary  wretchedness  in  the  rural  districts,  it  is  underdrawn.  The  cottage  in 
question  has  two  rooms.  Some  have  only  one,  with  as  great  a  number  pf  inmates  to 
occupy  it.  Some  of  them,  again,  have  three  or  four  rooms,  with  a  family  occupying  each 
room ;  the  families  so  circumstanced  amounting  each,  in  some  cases,  to  nine  or  ten  indi- 
viduals. In  some  cottages,  too,  a  lodger  is  accommodated,  who  occupies  the  same  apart- 
ment as  the  family.  Such,  fortunately,  is  not  the  condition  of  all  the  labourers  in  the 
agricultural  districts ;  but  it  is  the  condition  of  a  very  great  number  of  Englishmen — not 
in  the  backwoods  of  a  remote  settlement,  but  in  the  heart  of  Anglo-Saxon  civilization,  in 
the  year  of  grace  1849." 

Bad,  however,  as  is  all  this,  it  is  likely  to  be  worse.  Everywhere,  notices 
are  being  given  of  a  reduction  of  wages,  and  diminution  in  the  number  of 
persons  to  be  employed.  There  is  scarcely,  says  the  writer,  a  district  in  any 
of  these  counties  "  where  the  work  of  reducing  wages  has  not  already  com- 
menced." In  one  of  them,  as  early  as  last  June,  there  was  a  reduction  from 
8*.  to  7s.,  and  "  apprehensions  are  everywhere  entertained  that  they  will  be 
reduced' to  6*.  =$1-44."  "  Is  it  any  wonder,"  he  adds,  "  that,  with  such  a 
prospect  before  them,  the  agricultural  labourers  should  brood  over  their  cir- 
cumstances with  the  ominous  sullenness  of  despair  ?  What  is  that  prospect  ? 
The  winter  is  approaching — the  season  when  most  is  required  by  us  all  to 
administer  to  our  comforts.  They  are  entering  upon  that  season  with  here 
8s.,  there  6.s.,  and  there  again  but  5s.  a  week  for  the  support  of  their  families. 
How  far  will  these  pitiful  portions  go  in  households  of  five,  six,  seven,  eight, 
nine,  or  ten  individuals?  We  cannot,  in  estimating  a  labourer's  comforts  at 
any  given  time,  apply  to  them  the  test  of  his  average  wages.  It  is  his  wages 
for  the  time  being  that  decide  the  measure  of  his  condition.  Had  he  at  any 
time  more  than  was  necessary  to  carry  him  and  his  family  up  to  the  line  of 
comfort,  he  might  lay  by  the  surplus  for  adverse  times.  But  he  never  has 
what  secures  him  perfect  comfort,  and  is  always  more  than  tempted  to  spend 
all  he  gets.  He  therefore  commences  this  winter,  as  he  does  every  winter, 
without  any  reserve-fund  to  fall  back  upon  ;  and  the  fact  is  appalling  that, 
in  this  month  of  October,  thousands  of  families  in  the  very  heart  of  England 
have  no  better  prospect  before  them  than  that  of  living  on  8s.,  6s.,  and  even 
5s.  a  week,  in  their  cold,  damp,  cheerless,  and  unhealthy  homes." 

The  Canadian  farmer  is  invited  to  contend  in  the  market  of  England  with 
the  serf  of  Russia  for  the  privilege  of  supplying  with  food  men  to  whom  a 


160  THE   HARMONY  OF   INTERESTS/ 

morsel  of  bacon  on  a  Sunday  is  a  luxury,  when  by  the  simple  process  of 
annexation  and  protection  he  could  bring  to  his  side  the  same  men  and  con- 
vert them  into  large  and  valuable  customers.  The  planter  is  invited  to  con- 
tend in  the  market  of  England  for  the  privilege  of  clothing  men  who  want 
means  to  buy  bread,  when  by  an  exercise  of  his  will  he  could  bring  to  his 
side,  annually,  millions  of  the  same  men,  each  of  whom  would  then  require 
twenty  pounds  a  year,  two  millions  consuming  half  as  much  as  was  consumed 
in  1847  by  almost  thirty  millions  of  the  people  of  England  and  Wales. 

The  system  of  England  demands  that  with  such  people  as  these  we  shall 
establish  a  community  of  goods.  Were  it  allowed  free  play — were  the  people 
of  the  world  to  establish  what  is  called  free  trade,  and  thus  unite  their  efforts 
for  the  maintenance  of  the  monopoly  system,  wages  universally  would  fall  to 
the  level  of  those  of  the  poorest  countries  of  the  world,  for  with  every  step 
those  of  England  would,  of  necessity,  fall,  because  they  must  be  kept  at  that 
point  which  would  enable  her  people  to  underwork  the  world,  and  the  tendency 
everywhere  would  be,  as  it  has  been  in  Ireland  and  India,  downward. 
The  adoption  of  perfect  free  trade  by  this  country  would,  for  a  short  time, 
produce  some  activity  there,  but  a  very  short  period  would  prove  that  we 
bought  far  less  under  free  trade  than  we  had  done  with  protection,  and  in  the 
mean  time  the  disproportion  of  the  English  population  would  have  largely 
increased,  and  the  difficulty  would  be  then  far  greater  than  it  is  now,  great 
even  as  it  is.  We  now  pay  for  far  less  merchandise  than  we  did  three  years 
since,  and  were  it  not  that  we  are  still  able  to  buy  on  credit,  we  should  make 
smaller  demands  on  England  than  we  have  done  at  any  period  since  1842. 
The  greater  the  amount  of  capital  thus  lent  to  us,  the  lower  must  fall  the 
condition  of  the  English  labourer.  Every  step  now  being  made  by  England 
is  a  step  downwards,  and  if  we  would  not  have  our  labourers  reduced  to  a 
level  with  hers  we  must,  by  protection,  endeavour  to  raise  hers  to  a  level 
with  ours,  as  it  will  do  by  relieving  us  from  the  necessity  for  dependence  upon 
commerce  with  a  people  whose  labour  is  lower  in  the  scale  than  our  own.  It 
tends  to  raise  the  value  of  man  abroad  and  at  home,  and  to  enable  all  to  ob- 
tain more  food,  fuel,  and  clothing  with  less  labour.  Under  it  immigration 
has  always  increased,  and  it  has  declined  with  its  diminution.  That  it  must 
tend  to  raise  wages  abroad  is  obvious  from  the  fact  that  so  many  hundreds 
of  thousands  of  the  population  of  Europe,  held  to  be  surplus,  have  sought  our 
shores,  thus  diminishing  the  quantity  of  labour  seeking  there  to  be  employed. 

With  the  approach  to  what  is  called  freedom  of  trade,  that  system  which 
tends  to  the  maintenance  of  the  monopoly  ot  machinery  in  England,  the 
value  of  labour  here  is  falling  towards  the  level  of  that  of  England.  The 
present  diminished  production  of  coal  and  iron  is  maintained  only  by  aid  of 
a  great  diminution  of  wages.  Labour  is  becoming  surplus,  ard  immigration  is 
already  falling  off.  This  year  will  show  a  large  diminution  therein,  and 
every  step  in  that  direction  must  be  attended  with  a  rise  of  freights  tending 
to  diminish  the  power  to  export  either  food  or  cotton.  With  the  diminution 
of  wages  at  the  North,  there  is  already  a  diminished  power  to  consume  either 
food  or  clothing,  with  increase  in  the  surplus  that  is  to  be  sent.  Thus  the  same 
measures  that  increase  the  necessity  for  depending  on  machinery  of  trans- 
portation diminish  the  power  to  obtain  it,  to  the  deterioration  of  the  condition 
of  the  whole  body  of  the  people,  labourers  and  capitalists,  farmers  and 
planters,  manufacturers  and  ship-owners ;  and  the  same  which  tend  to  di- 
minish our  necessities  for  depending  thereon,  tend  to  increase  our  power  to 
obtain  it,  to  diminish  the  burden  now  pressing  upon  the  land-owners  and 
labourers  of  Europe,  and  to  bring  about  that  state  of  things  which  shall  give 
to  us  and  them  perfect  freedom  of  trade.  The  harmony  of  all  interests, 
whether  individual  or  national,  becomes  more  and  more  obvious  the  more  the 
subject  is  examined. 


THE  HARMONY  OF  INTERESTS.  161 

It  may  not  be  uninstructive  to  review  the  last  few  years,  with  special 
reference  to  the  discords  that  have  occasionally  been  seen  to  exist  between 
the  employers  and  the  employed,  accompanied  by  strikes,  combinations,  &c., 
with  a  view  to  show  their  cause. 

It  is  within  the  recollection  of  most  of  my  readers  that  the  years  from  1836 
to  1839  were  distinguished  for  disturbances  of  this  kind.  The  cause  is  ob- 
vious. Production  was  diminishing,  and  the  labourer  found  himself  unable 
to  obtain  the  quantity  of  food,  fuel,  and  clothing  to  which  he  had  been  .accus- 
tomed. He  desired  a  rise  of  money-wages  to  meet  the  rise  in  the  price  of 
food,  but  the  employer  could  not  give  it,  and  hence  arose  combinations  for 
the  purpose  of  compelling  him  to  do  so. 

From  1844  to  1848,  harmony  was  restored,  because  production  increased, 
and  the  labourer  found  that  each  year  enabled  him  to  obtain  more  food  and 
clothing,  and  better  shelter,  with  the  same  labour. 

The  last  year  has  been  marked  by  a  succession  of  combinations.  In  the  coal 
region  of  Pennsylvania,  at  Pittsburgh,  Lowell,  and  various  other  places,  there 
have  been  strikes  and  turn-outs,  some  of  them  long-continued  j  and  every- 
where there  have  been  clamours  for  the  passage  of  laws  restricting  the  hours 
of  labour ;  but  those  who  thus  clamoured  desired  that  wages  should  remain 
as  they  were.  These  things  all  result  from  the  one  great  fact  that  the  pro- 
ductiveness of  labour  is  diminishing,  and  that  wages  are  tending  towards  the 
European  level. 

To  that  cause  was  due  the  jealousy  of  foreigners  which  gave  rise  to  the 
"native"  party.  In  1842,  employment  was  almost  unattainable,  and  the 
native  workmen  were  indisposed  to  divide  with  strangers  the  little  that  was 
to  be  had.  With  the  increased  productiveness  of  labour  wages  rose,  and  the 
"native"  party  almost  died  out,  while  the  import  of  foreigners  was  quad- 
rupled. If  the  system  of  1846  be  continued,  the  same  jealousy  will  re-appear, 
and  foreigners  will  be  proscribed,  while  immigration  will  be  diminished. 

It  is  to  the  interest  of  the  native  workmen  that  the  wages  of  Europe  should 
be  brought  up  to  a  level  with  our  own,  and  the  only  way  in  which  that  can 
be  accomplished  is  for  us  to  pursue  a  course  that  shall  tend  to  render  it  the 
interest  of  every  man  in  Europe  that  can  find  means  to  pay  his  passage  to 
endeavour  to  reach  our  shores.  Every  one  that  comes  will  be  a  producer  of 
something,  and  every  one  therefore  a  customer  to  others  for  their  products. 
Look  where  we  may,  there  is  the  most  perfect  harmony  of  interest. 

CHAPTER  SIXTEENTH. 
HOW   PROTECTION  AFFECTS   THE   SLAVE  AND  HIS   MASTER. 

PROTECTION  tends  to  increase  the  productiveness  of  labour.  Many  of  the 
labourers  of  the  Union  are  held  as  slaves,  and  protection  must  tend  to  render 
their  labour  more  valuable  to  their  owners,  who  may,  therefore,  be  rendered 
less  disposed  to  part  with  them.  If  such  were  likely  to  be  the  fact,  protec- 
tion would  tend  to  perpetuate  slavery,  and  all  who  were  opposed  to  its  continu- 
ance should  advocate  free  trade. 

By  all  English  writers,  and  by  many  among  ourselves,  it  is  held  that  the 
way  to  terminate  the  existence  of  slavery  is  to  destroy  the  value  of  slave- 
labour.  With  that  view  the  British  government  is  urged  to  prohibit  slave- 
grown  sugar,  and  to  encourage  the  extension  of  the  cotton  culture  in  India — 
the  wretched  Hindoo,  who  labours  a  whole  month  for  two  rupees,  (one  dol- 
lar,) out  of  which  he  feeds  and  clothes  himself,  being  held  to  be  a  freer  man 
than  the  well-fed,  well-clothei,  and  well-lodged  labourer  of  Virginia  or  Ken- 
tucky. 

Throughout  the  world,  men  have  become  free  as  wealth  and  population 


162  THE   HARMONY  OF   INTERESTS. 


bave  grown,  and  as  land  has  increased  in  value.  In  the  early  days  of  Rome, 
when  Latiuni  was  filled  with  prosperous  cities,  land  was  valuable,  and  men 
were  free.  With  the  gradual  depopulation  of  Italy,  land  lost  its  value,  and 
large  masses  accumulated  in  the  hands  of  great  proprietors  surrounded  by 
slaves.  So  was  it  in  Attica.  In  the  days  of  Solon,  land  was  valuable  and 
men  were  free.  In  those  of  Herodes  Atticus,  land  was  valueless  and  men 
were  slaves.  The  richest  lands  of  India  have  been  abandoned  and  are  now 
jungle,  and  the  descendants  of  the  little  village  proprietors  of  the  last  cen- 
tury now  sell  themselves  to  slavery  in  Jamaica  and  Demerara.  In  Russia, 
land  has  no  value.  The  value  of  a  property  is  estimated  by  the  number  of 
its  serfs.  In  Belgium,  land  has  great  value,  and  the  people  are  the  freest  in 
Europe.  With  the  gradual  increase  in  the  value  of  land  in  England,  men 
became  more  free,  whereas  with  every  step  tending  to  increase  dependence 
on  Poland  and  Russia  for  food,  land  is  becoming  less  valuable,  labourers  are 
becoming  more  and  more  the  inhabitants  of  parish  work-houses  and  the 
slaves  of  parish  beadles,  and  landowners  are  becoming  more  and  more  anxious 
to  expel  the  population  that  would  otherwise  give  value  to  the  land.  The 
land  of  Ireland  has  almost  lost  its  value,  and  the  labourer  of  Ireland  has 
become  a  slave  to  the  caprices  of  masters  who  regard  him  as  an  encumbrance 
to  be  gotten  rid  of  by  any  process,  however  cruel. 

Increase  in  the  value  of  land  tends  towards  freedom ;  decrease  tends  to- 
wards slavery.  If  protection  tends  to  add  value  to  land,  it  tends  to  the  pro- 
motion of  freedom ;  if  it  tends  to  diminish  its  value,  it  tends  to  the  mainte- 
nance of  slavery. 

The  least  valuable  land  is  that  in  which  men  are  most  rare  ;  the  most  valua- 
ble is  that  in  which  they  most  abound.  The  cause  of  the  difference  between 
the  two  is  to  be  found  in  the  difference  in  the  labour  required  for  the  per- 
formance of  exchanges.  The  hills  of  Limburg,  the  poorest  part  of  Belgium, 
rent  for  from  six  to  eight  dollars;  and  for  flax  land  in  Flanders,  ten  to 
twelve  dollars  per  acre  is  a  common  rent ;  while  cotton-producing  land  of 
the  highest  quality  may  here  be  had,  in  fee,  for  one-eighth  of  the  latter  sum. 
The  one  has  a  market  on  the  land,  and  the  other  has  not ;  and  in  this  single 
and  simple  fact  may  be  found  nearly  the  whole  reason  for  this  enormous 
disproportion. 

The  man  who  lives  in  Arkansas  has  to  employ  numerous  men,  horses, 
steamboats,  ships,  and  warehouses,  in  the  performance  of  every  exchange, 
and  the  consequence  is,  that  he  receives  for  the  produce  of  his  land  little 
more  than  compensation  for  his  labour,  and  his  land  has  scarcely  any  value. 
He  can  raise  for  market  little  else  than  cotton,  of  which  the  earth  yields  but 
little,  for  which  reason  it  commands  a  price  that  will  enable  it  to  bear  trans- 
portation. His  surplus  corn  is  almost  valueless;  while  to  attempt  to  raise  for 
market  potatoes  or  turnips,  of  which  the  earth  yields  by  hundreds  of  bushels 
to  the  acre,  would  be  ruinous. 

The  man  who  lives  near  New  York  exchanges  directly  with  the  consumer 
of  his  products  and  the  producers  of  the  commodities  that  he  desires  to  con- 
sume. He  can  raise  potatoes,  turnips,  and  cabbages,  bulky  articles;  or 
strawberries  and  raspberries,  delicate  ones — none  of  which  will  bear  trans- 
portation. He  sells,  his  milk,  and  is  not  compelled  to  convert  it  into  butter 
or  cheese.  He  is  not  required  to  convert  his  corn  into  pork,  with  a  view  to 
diminishing  its  bulk  and  enabling  it  to  go  to  market.  His  products  are  all 
consumed  near  him,  and  he  can  readily  return  to  the  land  the  refuse,  increas- 
ing its  productive  power  from  year  to  year.  The  amount  yielded  is  far 
more  than  wages  for  his  labour,  and  the  whole  surplus  is  the  rent  he  de- 
rives from  his  land,  fifteen  or  twenty  years  purchase  of  which  is  its  market 
value. 


THE   HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS.  163 

That  value  is  three,  four,  five,  or  six  hundred  dollars  per  acre,  while  land 
in  Arkansas  is  now  offered  in  free  gift  to  those  who  will  come  and  pay  the 
taxes.  The  sole  cause  of  the  difference  is,  that  the  owner  of  the  one  ex- 
changes directly  with  the  men  who  make  hats  and  coats,  shoes  and  stock- 
ings, ploughs  and  harrows,  and  the  other  does  not.  To  make  the  land  of 
Arkansas  as  valuable  as  that  near  New  York,  it  would  be  necessary  that  its 
owner  should  exchange  for  hats  and  shoes,  ploughs  and  harrows,  as  freely  as 
does  the  man  of  New  York ;  that  is,  he  must  make  a  market  on  the  land  for 
the  products  of  the  land.  The  return  to  labour  would  then  be  large,  and 
the  value  of  man  would  rise ;  but  all  that  was  returned  over  and  above  the 
wages  of  the  labourer  would  be  rent,  and  the  value  of  land  would  rise. 
Men  would  then  become  free ;  first,  because  the  cost  of  raising  a  slave  would 
be  far  more  than  he  was  worth  when  raised ;  and,  second,  because  the  land 
would  be  too  valuable  to  be  cultivated  by  slaves. 

The  man  of  Wisconsin  can  afford  to  raise  hogs,  because  corn  is  but  twenty 
cents  a  bushel.  The  man  near  New  York  cannot,  because  corn  is  worth 
sixty  cents.  The  man  of  Arkansas  can  afford  to  raise  slaves,  because  they 
are  worth  as  much  as  they  cost  to  raise.  The  man  near  New  York  could  not, 
because  they  would  cost  him  more  than  their  services  would  repay.  Had 
Arkansas  a  market  on  the  land  for  all  the  products  of  the  land,  hired  labour 
would  be  found  so  much  cheaper  that  no  man  would  desire  to  raise  a  slave. 

The  man  who  owns  valuable  machinery  cannot  afford  to  employ  poor 
labour.  The  interest  on  his  factory  is  as  great  if  the  looms  produce  but 
twenty -five  yards  per  day  as  if  they  produced  fifty.  With  the  former  quan- 
tity he  would  be  ruined.  With  the  latter  he  would  grow  rich.  The  slave 
will  give  him  the  one — the  freeman  the  other.  To  make  the  slave  work  like 
the  freeman,  he  must  have  an  inducement — that  is,  he  must  receive  wages. 

Were  ,a  large  landholder  near  New  York  offered  the  services  of  men,  their 
wives  and  families,  on  the  same  terms  as  the  planter  has  those  of  his  slaves — to 
feed,  clothe  and  lodge  them — he  could  not  profitably  accept  them ;  and  yet 
the  money-price  of  such  labour  is  at  least  twice  as  great  as  at  the  South. 
The  price  of  their  food,  however,  would  be  thrice  as  great,  and  they  would 
require  more  clothing,  and  their  children  must  be  educated ;  and  to  obtain 
all  these  things  there  would  be  needed  the  exertion  of  the  man  working  for 
himself,  and  the  economy  of  one  who  looked  to  the  future  for  himself  and  his 
family.  Were  such  an  offer  accepted,  the  party  accepting  would  speedily 
find  that  his  people  produced  less  and  wasted  more  than  those  of  his  neigh- 
bours, and  that  the  rent  of  his  land  was  diminished  by  the  arrangement. 

Place  in  the  Southern  States  machinery  for  converting  into  cloth  half  a 
million  of  bales  of  cotton,  and  for  producing  half  a  million  of  tons  of  bar- 
iron,  and  there  would  be  created  a  great  demand  for  labour.  The  facility  of 
obtaining  iron  in  exchange  for  corn  and  cotton  would  cause  the  making  of 
thousands  of  miles  of  railroad,  and  here  would  be  a  new  demand  for  labour. 
The  mills,  the  furnaces,  and  the  roads  would  bring  towns,  filled  with  tailors, 
shoemakers,  hatters,  blacksmiths,  makers  of  ploughs  and  harrows,  looms, 
spindles,  and  steam-engines,  and  here  would  be  a  new  and  large  demand  for 
labour,  while  the  number  of  labourers  would  not  be  increased.  It  would 
then  become  necessary  to  economize  labour  because  of  its  increased  value. 
How  could  it  be  done  ?  The  slave  would  do  no  more  than  his  accustomed 
work,  without  an  inducement,  and  that  is  to  be  found  in  wages.  The  in- 
creased product  of  his  labour  would  thenceforth  go  to  himself. 

Large  crops  would  then  be  obtained  in  lieu  of  small  ones,  and  one  hun- 
dred bushels  of  corn,  or  one  hundred  pounds  of  cotton  would  then  buy 
more  cloth  or  iron  than  now  are  obtained  for  three.  The  increased  value  of 
crops  would  raise  the  price  of  land,  and  if  that  should  average  but  ten 


THE   HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS. 


dollars  per  acre  over  the  South,  it  would  amount  to  four  thousand  millions 
of  dollars,  and  thus  would  the  planters  be  made  rich. 

Here,  then,  are  two  commodities,  man  and  land,  both  increasing  in  value, 
but  the  increase  in  the  one  goes  to  the  man  himself,  while  that  of  the  other 
goes  to  the  owner.  What  would  be  the  effect  of  this  on  their  market  value  ? 
Where  property  is  steadily  growing  in  value,  it  sells  for  twenty,  thirty,  and 
even  more  years'  purchase  of  its  rent.  Such  would  be  the  case  with  land. 

When  property  is  decreasing  in  value,  it  sells  for  six,  eight,  or  ten  years' 
purchase  of  the  rent  that  can  be  commanded  for  its  use.  Such  would  be  the 
case  with  the  slave.  With  the  increased  productiveness  of  his  labour  he 
would  be  obtaining  for  himself  an  increased  proportion,  leaving  a  diminished 
one  to  his  owner,  and  thus  would  the  value  of  the  slave  be  transferred  to 
the  land. 

To  raise  a  slave  would  then  become  too  costly.  What  then  would  become 
of  the  children  ?  The  parents,  everywhere,  make  sacrifices  for  their  offspring, 
and  by  them  alone  can  children  be  raised,  where  land  is  valuable.  To  in- 
duce those  sacrifices  they  must  know  that  they  are  working  for  their  own 
children,  and  not  for  their  master's  slaves. 

With  increase  in  the  value  comes  the  division  of  land.  Great  plantations 
would  become  small  ones,  each  of  which  would  yield  more  than  is  now 
yielded  by  the  whole.  Small  farms  would  come,  cultivated  by  negro  tenants, 
and  thus  step  by  step  would  men,  their  wives  and  children,  become  free, 
as  their  late  owners  were  becoming  rich. 

To  accomplish  both  these  objects  it  is  necessary  that  the  people  of  the 
South  should  have  mills  and  furnaces  to  make  a  market  on  the  land  for  the 
products  of  the  land.  Those  they  cannot  have  without  protection  against  the 
monopoly  system  by  which  they  are  now  being  exhausted.  The  abolitionist 
and  the  slaveholder  should  then  unite  in  the  demand  for  the  adoption  of 
measures  tending  to  the  abolition  of  the  English  monopoly  of  machinery. 

The  former  would,  however,  say  that  the  process  would  be  too  slow.  On 
the  contrary,  it  would  be  most  rapid.  Had  the  tariff  of  1828  continued  in 
existence  to  the  present  time,  the  lands  of  the  South  would  now  be  trebled 
in  value,  and  the  slaves  of  the  South  would  now  be  far  advanced  towards 
freedom. 

The  latter  would  say  that  they  would  lose  their  property.  The  answer 
would  be  that  for  every  dollar  of  diminished  value  in  man,  they  would  have 
five,  or  ten,  or  twenty  in  the  increased  value  of  land.  It  would  be  precisely 
as  land  became  valuable  that  man  would  become  free. 

The  Union  is  now  agitated  by  the  question  whether  or  not  slavery  shall 
be  carried  beyond  its  present  limits.  The  agitators  are  determined  to  force 
the  Wilmot  proviso  upon  the  South,  and  the  people  of  the  latter  declare  that 
they  will  dissolve  the  Union  rather  than  submit  to  it.  Neither  is  disposed 
to  penetrate  below  the  surface  to  understand  the  cause  of  difficulty. 

If  a  demand  for  labour  existed  in  the  Slave  States,  consequent  upon  making 
a  market  on  the  land  for  its  products,  the  necessity  for  emigration  would 
pass  away,  and  immigration  would  begin.  The  people  of  the  South  would 
not  then  desire  to  go  to  California,  nor  would  those  of  the  North  deem  it 
necessary  to  pass  laws  to  prevent  them  from  so  doing.  All  the  discord  be- 
tween the  different  portions  of  the  Union  results  from  the  existence  of  the 
colonial  system,  which  it  is  the  object  of  protection  to  terminate,  and  thereby 
raise  the  value  of  land  and  of  man,  black  or  white,  throughout  the  world. 

This  question  has  thus  far  been  looked  at  as  one  of  dollars  and  cents  merely, 
and  such  is  the  light  in  which  it  should  be  examined.  When  it  can  be 
shown  to  be  the  interest  of  a  body  of  men  to  pursue  a  certain  course,  we  may 
wifely  calculate  upon  its  being  pursued  by  a  large  portion  of  them  ;  but 


THE   HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS.  165 

when  we  confine  ourselves  to  showing  that  it  is  their  duty,  and  that  in  the 
performance  of  that  duty  they  must  neglect  their  interests,  we  may  as  safely 
calculate  that  very  few  will  follow  in  the  course  thus  indicated.  The  agitators 
of  the  North  would  impair  the  value  of  property  and  destroy  the  peace  of  the 
South,  while  deteriorating  the  condition  of  the  objects  of  their  sympathy,  and 
all  this  they  would  do  that  others  might  be  compelled  to  perform  their  duties. 
It  is  time  that  the  reasonable  men,  North  and  South,  should  understand 
each  other,  and  determine  to  adopt  the  course  that  would  give  value  to  labour 
and  land,  and  thus  relieve  themselves  from  the  dangers  incident  to  the  agi- 
tation of  men  who  would  destroy  the  value  of  both. 

With  every  step  of  improvement  in  the  value  of  land,  there  would  come 
improvement  in  the  physical  and  moral  aondition  of  its  owner.  Throughout 
the  South,  there  is  evejj  now  a  growing  indisposition  to  hold  men  in  slavery ; 
but  how  rapidly  and  widely  would  that  feeling  extend  itself  were  the  owners 
of  land  and  of  slaves  to  feel  themselves  growing  richer  instead  of  poorer,  as 
is  now  the  case.  The  cause  of  emancipation  has  been  going  backwards  for 
the  last  twenty  years,  and  those  who  desire  to  know  why  it  is  so  have  only 
to  look  to  the  fact,  that,  in  1845-6,  600,000,000  of  pounds  of  cotton  would 
not  bring  as  much  iron  to  the  plantation  as  100,000,000  would  have  done 
thirty  years  before,  or  275,000,000  only  a  dozen  years  before.*  The  conse- 
quence has  been  a  growing  tendency  to  the  abandonment  of  land,  and  an 
increased  regard  for  that  species  of  property  which  was  capable  of  being 
transferred,  which  land  was  not.  Harassed  and  annoyed  by  abolitionists  on 
the  one  hand,  and  on  the  other  by  a  constant  deterioration  in  the  value  of  the 
only  crop  upon  which  he  has  been  accustomed  to  depend,  and  compelled  to 
change  from  that  to  sugar  or  to  wheat,  it  is  no  matter  of  surprise  that  there 
should  have  been  produced  the  state  of  feverish  excitement  now  witnessed 
everywhere  in  the  planting  States,  and  which  must  increase  unless  the  loom 
can  be  brought  to  take  its  place  by  the  side  of  the  cotton. 

It  is  a  common  impression,  that  the  people  of  South  Carolina  have  ex- 
hausted their  rich  lands,  and  that  they  are  moving  away  from  poor  ones,  yet 
nothing  can  be  more  erroneous.  They  commenced  upon  poor  soils,  as  has 
been  done  in  every  country  of  the  world,  and  they  are  now  flying  from 
meadow-lands  capable  of  yielding  the  finest  artificial  grasses,  of  which  they 
have  millions  of  acres  untouched ;  from  river  bottoms  uncleared,  from 
swamps  undrained,  and  from  marl,  and  lime,  and  iron  ore,  all  of  which  exist 
in  almost  unlimited  quantity.  Nature  has  done  for  that  State  every  thing 
that  could  be  done ;  but  man  has,  as  yet,  done  nothing  but  exhaust  the  poor 
soils  upon  which  the  work  of  cultivation  was  first  commenced,  and  therefore 
it  is  that  their  agricultural  reports,  and  their  newspapers  repeat,  year  after 
year,  the  question,  "  What  shall  the  cotton  planters  do  ?" 

"  This,"  says  the  editor  of  the  South  Carolinian,  « is  a  question  daily  asked  by  our 
planting  friends.  There  seems,"  he  continues, "  at  present  great  solicitude  as  to  the  policy 
which  is  to  be  pursued  by  them  in  pitching  their  next  crop.  We  hear  the  cry  of  less 
cotton  and  more  grain  ringing  from  one  end  of  the  State  to  the  other.  We  are  not  sur- 
prised that  many  planters  who  plant  heavily  should  say  their  present  crop  will  bring 
them  in  debt  if  the  ruinoms  prices  continue  much  longer.  No  planter  can  make  both 
ends  meet  who  receives  only  four  or  five  cents  for  his  cotton,  and  has  to  pay  the  present 
exorbitant  prices  for  bagging,  bale  rope,  pork,  mules,  sugar,  coffee,  salt,  and  iron.  Mules 
are  high,  pork  is  high,  bagging  and  rope  are  up  to  the  prices  of  the  twelve  and  fifteen 
cent  times  of  cotton,  and  sugar,  coffee,  iron,  and  salt  steadily  stand  at  the  old  rates.  If 
to  expenditures  for  these  necessary  articles,  the  planter  has  to  add  his  negro  clothes, 
shoes,  hats,  and  blankets,  he  will  have  nothing  left  to  remunerate  him  for  his  labour. 

•  See  page  58,  ontt. 


166  THE   HARMONY  'OF   INTERESTS. 

These  are  really  matters  which  they  should  ponder  over,  and  a  system  of  planting,  which 
does  not  repay  for  the  labour  and  investment  of  capital  engaged  in  it,  we  reasonably 
think  would  soon  be  abandoned.  But  it  will  not  be.  Our  planters  are  taught  no  other 
systems ;  they  do  not  know  how  they  will  supply  the  vacuum  which  would  be  made  by 
an  immediate  abandonment  of  the  cotton  crop.  It  would  take  several  years  before  they 
could  perfect,  with  the  strictest  economy,  those  arrangements  which  would  render  them 
entirely  independent  of  it  as  a  marketable  crop.  Therefore  the  step  taken  should  be 
wisely  considered  before  adopted,  and  the  utmost  caution  should  be  observed  in  making, 
what  we  sincerely  believe  would  be,  if  once  begun,  a  radical  change  in  our  system  of 
agriculture.  We  therefore  advise,  for  the  coming  year,  a  reduction  simply  of  one-third 
of  the  cotton  crop  throughout  the  State — devoting,  at  the  same  time,  the  land  thus  thrown 
out  of  the  cultivation  of  this  crop  to  the  production  of  grain  and  the  increase  of  labour, 
which  would  thus  be  given,  to  the  proper  manuring  and  improved  tillage  of  the  cotton 
planted  and  the  general  improvement  of  the  plantation.  By  this  process  the  cotton  lands 
would  be  increased  in  fertility,  and  the  increase  of  grain  which  would  follow  would 
greatly  facilitate  the  rearing  of  mules,  hogs,  cattle,  and  sheep ;  and  in  a  short  time  the 
whole  State  could  render  itself  independent  of  the  exactions  of  our  Kentucky  neighbours, 
who  kindly  supply  us  with  all  such  things,  simply  at  the  expense  of  the  prosperity  of 
our  agricultural  population ;  for,  in  practice,  they  annually  sweep  the  country  of  all  the 
surplus  cash  which  is  afloat  in  payment  for  their  bacon  and  mules.  We  would,  if  this 
system  were  adopted,  soon  be  able  to  produce  as  much  cotton  on  fifty  acres  as  we  do 
now  on  one  hundred  ;  and  the  investment  of  the  agricultural  profits  of  the  State  at  home, 
although  they  might  be  small,  would  have  a  wonderful  influence  on  general  prosperity, 
and  build  facilities  throughout  our  now  desolate  and  almost  unapproachable  State,  which 
would  not  only  enchain  our  own  sons  to  her  borders,  but  induce  capitalists  to  come  into 
our  midst,  to  make  their  dollars  tell  by  learning  us  a  lesson  of  practical  enterprise.  We 
say  to  the  planters,  raise  less  cotton,  more  grain,  more  mules,  more  hogs ;  make  your  own 
negro  clothes;  i  ise  sheep) — make  your  own  blankets;  erect  tan-yards — encourage  shoe- 
makers and  ha"  ;;  in  fact,  artisans  of  all  kinds  to  settle  permanently  amongst  you  ; 
labour  at  makii,  _>  our  soil  rich,  and  do  not  devote  all  your  energies  to  wearing  it  out,  and 
soon  all  things  will  go  well  with  you.  You  will  not  make  so  many  bales  of  cotton ;  in 
fact,  may  not  cut  such  a  swell  on  your  factors'  books ;  but,  take  our  word  for  it,  you  will 
have  happier  slaves,  richer  lands,  more  thrift  and  fewer  debts,  and  sleepless  thoughts,  to 
harass  your  hours  of  rest." 

It  is  impossible  to  read  this  without  being  struck  with  the  fact,  that,  while, 
from  the  exhaustion  of  her  original  poor  soils,  and  her  inability  to  clear  and 
drain  rich  ones,  that  State  is  unable  to  produce  cotton  in  competition  with 
her  neighbours,  she  is  a  large  importer  of  other  agricultural  produce.  Her 
chief  city  is  supplied  with  hay  from  the  North,  notwithstanding  her  abund- 
ance of  rich  meadow  land.  She  consumes  the  pork  of  Ohio,  and  she  uses 
the  mules  of  Kentucky;  and  thus,  while  selling  her  products  at  the  low 
price  that  is  necessarily  consequent  upon  her  distance  from  the  place  at 
which  her  food  and  cotton  are  to  be  converted  into  cloth,  she  buys  of  others 
food,  mules,  &c.,  at  the  highest  price,  because  of  her  distance  from  the  place 
of  production.  She  wastes  labour  and  manure  upon  the  road,  and  is  then 
surprised  at  the  exhaustion  that  results  necessarily  from  such  a  course  of 
policy. 

The  remedy  for  all  this  may,  it  is  supposed,  be  found,  first,  in  diminishing 
the  quantity  of  cotton ;  but  that  is  already  diminishing  so  rapidly  that  the 
great  cause  of  apprehension  throughout  the  State  seems  to  be  that  its  cultiva- 
tion must  soon  cease,  because  of  inability  to  produce  it>  She  desires  to  dimi- 
nish the  supply  of  cotton,  while  her  people  are  flying  from  her  to  seek  the 
west,  there  to  produce  more  cotton.  Second,  the  lands  are  to  be  manured, 
but  we  are  not  told  from  whence  the  manure  is  to  come.  The  State  has 
scarcely  any  consumers  of  agricultural  produce  except  those  who  are  engaged 
in  its  production,  and  their  consumption  yields  but  little  manure.  Her 
horses  are  always  on  the  road,  wasting  the  manure  yielded  by  her  hay  and 
her  corn,  and  her  rice  and  cotton  are  consumed  abroad,  the  consequence  of 


THE   HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS.  167 

which  is,  th;vt  of  what  is  yielded  by  the  land  nothing  goes  back,  and  the 
land  and  its  •owner  become  impoverished  together.  Her  population  dimi- 
nishes. Everybody  is  seeking  to  find  elsewhere  a  better  place  for  employ- 
ing his  capital  and  his  labour.  Under  such  circumstances  it  is  useless  to 
talk  about  artificial  manures,  and  her  swamps  and  river  bottoms,  in  which 
manure  has  for  ages  accumulated,  will  not  pay  the  cost  of  clearing  for  the 
raising  of  three  or  four  hundred  pounds  of  cotton  to  the  acre.  Give  her  a 
consuming  population  that  will  make  a  market  on  the  ground  for  the  tons 
of  potatoes,  and  turnips,  and  hay,  and  the  milk,  and  the  veal,  that  will  be 
yielded  by  rich  soils,  and  the  State  will  become  one  of  the  richest  of  the 
Union.  It  is  population  that  makes  food  come  from  the  rich  soils,  as  we  see 
to  be  the  case  in  Belgium,  and  England,  and  New  England ;  and  it  is  depo- 
pulation that  drives  men  back  to  the  poorer  ones,  as  is  shown  in  Ireland, 
India,  South  Carolina,  and  Virginia.  The  people  of  Ireland  are  flying  from 
each  other  as  if  from  pestilence,  and  yet  that  unfortunate  island,  in  which 
men  are  restricted  almost  entirely  to  the  cultivation  of  the  land,  offers  us 
now  the  chief  European  market  for  our  surplus  food,  while  South  Carolina, 
destitute  of  consumers,  is  one  of  the  principal  markets  of  populous  Ohio 
for  her  surplus  products.  Whenever  the  former  shall  begin  to  consume  on 
the  land  the  products  of  the  land,  she  will  have  manure  to  keep  in  cultiva- 
tion her  poor  soils,  and  she  will  acquire  ability  to  clear  and  drain  the  rich 
ones,  and  then  she  may  export  hay  instead  of  importing  it.  Ireland,  like 
South  Carolina,  abounds  in  rich  soils  untouched.  She  has  millions  of  acres 
of  bog  that  could  be  drained  with  far  less  labour,  and  at  far  less  cost,  than 
have  been  required  for  similar  lands  in  England,  and  it  is  estimated  that 
three  millions  of  these  acres  would  afford  food  for  six  millions  of  people; 
but,  also,  like  South  Carolina,  she  is  compelled  to  waste  on  the  road  the 
labour  and  manure  yielded  by  the  poorer  soils  now  in  cultivation,  and  is 
thereby  rendered  too  poor  to  clear  and  drain  the  rich  ones,  wliich  never 
have  paid,  and  never  can  pay,  the  cost  of  preparation,  without  the  presence 
of  a  consuming  population  requiring  the  potatoes,  and  the  turnips,  and  the 
hay,  of  which  the  earth  yields  by  tons,  and  not  by  pounds  or  bushels. 

Had  the  people  of  the  Southern  States,  during  the  last  twenty  years,  been 
making  for  themselves,  out  of  their  own  coal,  ore,  and  limestone,  an  average 
of  only  250,000  tons  of  iron,  the  quantity  made  in  that  time  would  have 
been  five  millions  of  tons,  all  of  which  would  now  be  there  in  the  various 
forms  of  agricultural  and  manufacturing  machinery,  railroads,  cars,  and  loco- 
motives, and  they  would  now  be  adding  to  the  quantity  at  the  rate  of  half  a 
million  of  tons  annually. 

Fifty  thousand  tons  of  iron  would  make  almost  500  miles  of  single  track 
road.  Let  us  suppose  that  they  averaged  annually  but  half  that  quantity, 
and  had  now,  as  they  might  easily  have,  5000  miles  of  road  running  through 
populous  manufacturing  villages  in  which  they  were  converting  their  cotton 
into  cloth  or  yarn  for  the  supply  of  the  world,  and  then  let  us  estimate  what 
would  be  the  increased  value  of  the  landed  property  of  those  States.  An 
average  annual  product  exceeding  that  of  the  present  time  to  the  extent  of 
only  one  dollar  per  acre  of  the  States  south  of  Mason  and  Dixon's  line,  would 
represent  a  capital  of  six  thousand  millions  of  dollars,  being  perhaps  five 
times  the  present  value  of  their  slave  population,  all  of  which  would  be  at 
this  moment  on  the  highway  towards  freedom  as  their  masters  were  making 
their  way  towards  fortune.* 

Instead  of  pursuing  a  course  that  would  have  enabled  them  to  profit  by  the 

•  Emigration  from  the  noh  lands  of  the  older  States  of  the  South  would  then  cease,  and 
immigration  would  begin,  and  thenceforth  the  increase  in  the  value  of  land  would  b*> 
immense. 


168  THE   HARMONY   OF  INTERESTS. 

magnificence  of  their  position,  the  planters  have  allowed  themselves  to 
be  taxed  for  the  maintenance  of  the  people  of  England,  who  produce  little 
themselves,  and  have  therefore  but  very  little  to  give  in  exchange  for  the  vas\ 
mass  of  agricultural  products  they  receive,  the  consequence  of  which  is,  that 
their  customers  are  becoming  poorer  every  day,  and  they  themselves  are  fasf, 
passing  towards  a  state  of  exhaustion  similar  to  that  they  have  produced  in 
Ireland,  India,  the  West  Indies,  and  evejy  other  country  that  has  been  com- 
pelled to  submit  to  their  most  unnatural  system.  A  writer,  describing  the 
present  position  of  affairs,  says  : — 

"  As  a  disinterested  spectator  of  events,  I  assure  yon  that  during  a  residence  of  nearly 
ten  years  in  England,  I  have  not  seen  the  different  branches  of  trade  in  so  disastrous  a 
position  as  they  are  at  present ;  and  from  the  petty  dealer  to  the  wholesale  tradesman,  ] 
have  never  heard  so  many  complaints  about  the  wretched  state  of  trade,  not  only  in  the 
metropolis,  but  generally  throughout  the  country.  I  place  more  confidence  in  the  state- 
ments of  a  dozen  respectable  tradesmen  than  I  do  in  "trade  circulars,"  which  are  usually 
got  up  to  serve  certain  interests,  or  to  cover  the  real  truth,  and  incite  speculation.  If  I 
were  to  give  an  impartial  opinion,  I  should  unhesitatingly  say  that  the  repeal  of  the  corn- 
laws,  the  repeal  of  the  navigation  laws  and  the  railway  mania,  have  together  produced 
the  present  panic— for  it  is  useless  to  say  that  there  is  not  a  panic  ;  the  leading  men  of 
nearly  every  class  declare  it  by  their  looks,  their  words,  and  their  actions. 

"The  parish  of  St.  Clement's  Danes,  one  of  the  richest  parishes  of  the  metropolis,  where 
I  am  now  residing,  shows  the  real  condition  of  the  general  trades-people  of  London. 
The  Church-warden  of  this  parish  recently  informed  me  that  three  applications  had  been 
made  to  the  parishioners  for  the  amount  of  their  poor  rates  and  other  taxes,  and  not  more 
than  one  in  twenty  had  paid  their  bills,  and  he  intended  to  issue  summonses  against  the 
delinquents.  He  also  remarked,  that  during  a  residence  of  eighteen  years  in  this  parish, 
he  had  never  known  trade  to  be  so  dull  as  it  is  now." 

What  prospect  there  is  of  improvement  may  be  gathered  from  the  follow- 
ing extract  from  a  journal  that  is  the  highest  free-trade  authority  in  Eng- 
land : — 

«  We  may  not  unreasonably  fear,  therefore,  that,  so  far  as  Ireland  is  concerned,  a  con- 
siderable source  of  the  progressive  increase  of  the  population  and  wealth  of  the  empire 
is  much  diminished,  if  not  absolutely  dried  up.  Other  sources  of  increase  have,  at  the 
same  time,  been  opened  to  us ;  but  whether  these  will  balance,  or  more  than  balance,  the 
loss  occasioned  by  the  condition  of  Ireland  is  more  than  we  can  say.  For  many  years 
the  condition  of  the  population  there  was  gradually  deteriorating,  while  their  numbers 
increased  ;  that  terrible  process  has  at  length  reached  its  climax,  and  the  present  genera- 
tion has  to  sustain  the  deteriorated,  and  we  fear  demoralized  mass,  without  any  imme- 
diate hope  of  their  being  restored  to  habits  of  productive  industry.  It  seems  right  to  put 
all  classes  at  once  on  their  guard,  lest  the  decrease  of  population  noticed  in  the  last 
quarter,  may,  from  the  causes  we  have  mentioned,  be  an  index  to  a  permanently  slower 
increase  in  population  than  has  hitherto  taken  place." — Economist  (London.) 

With  such  a  state  of  things  the  consumption  of  our  products  cannot 
increase.  The  question  to  be  answered  is,  "  Can  it  even  be  maintained  ?" 
Whenever  population  diminishes  in  its  ratio  of  growth,  it  is  an  evidence  of  a 
deterioration  of  condition,  and  when  that  is  going  on,  the  first  effect  is  felt  in 
the  diminished  demand  for  clothing,  for  food  is  the  want  that  must  be  first 
supplied. 

Let  it  but  be  known  that  the  people  of  this  country,  North,  South,  East, 
and  West,  are  determined  that  the  seat  of  the  cotton  and  iron  manufactures 
of  the  world  is  to  be  here,  and  the  transfer  of  men  and  machinery  will 
be  such  as  to  exceed  all  present  calculation,  and  every  man  that  comes  will 
consume  three,  four,  five,  six,  or  twelve  times  as  much  cotton  as  at  present, 
while  taking  all  his  food  from  our  own  farmers,  who  then  will  consume  three 
pounds  where  now  they  consume  but  one.  The  remedy  for  all  the  grievances 
of  the  planters  is  in  their  own  hands,  and  it  lies  in  the  pursuance  of  a  policy 
advocated  by  the  fathers  of  the  Revolution,  and  by  every  chief  magistrate  of 


THE   HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS.  169 

the  Union,  from  Washington  to  Jackson,  and  of  all  of  them  but  two  were 
from  south  of  Mason  and'  Dixon's  line,  and  all  but  those  two  elected  by  the 
same  party  that  now  repudiates  protection. 

Of  all  the  chapters  in  the  history  of  the  people  of  this  Union,  the  most 
honourable  to  them,  as  I  believe,  is  that  in  which  is  recorded  the  history  of 
the  negro  race.  The  three  hundred  thousand  barbarians  imported  into  this 
country  are  now  represented  by  almost  four  millions  of  people,  far  advanced 
towards  civilization  and  freedom,  and  to  that  number  they  have  grown 
because  they  have  been  well  fed,  well  clothed,  well  sheltered,  and  reasonably 
worked.  It  is  a  case  totally  without  a  parallel  in  the  world,  the  history  of 
which  may  be  challenged  for  the  production  of  a  body  of  men  invested  with 
so  much  power  over  their  fellow-men  as  has  been  exercised  by  the  people  of 
the  South,  and  using  it  so  moderately  as  to  permit  so  rapid  an  advance  in 
numbers  and  so  great  an  improvement  of  condition. 

Nevertheless,  they  are  unceasingly  stigmatized  as  slave-drivers  and  negro- 
breeders,  and  by  the  nation  which  lives  out  of  them,  and  which  of  all  the 
nations  of  Europe  possessing  colonies  has  most  misused  its  power  over  the  ne- 
gro race,  because  the  only  one  which  has  established  laws  prohibiting  the 
consumer  and  the  producer  from  taking  their  places  by  each  other.  It  was 
remarked  many  years  since,  by  an  intelligent  English  traveller,*  that  to  the 
French  islands  men  went  to  remain  and  to  exercise  trades,  but  to  the  Eng- 
lish ones  they  went  only  to  endeavour  to  make  fortunes,  and  then  return. 
So  has  it  everywhere  been,  and  what  have  been  the  results  ?  In  India,  poverty 
the  most  extraordinary,  and  a  succession  of  famines  and  pestilences  without 
a  parallel;  in  the  West  Indies,  a  waste  of  life  equally  unparalleled,  requir- 
ing constant  importations  for  the  mere  maintenance  of  their  numbers.  From 
1817  to  1829,  a  period  of  twelve  years,  the  slaves  of  Jamaica  were  reduced 
in  numbers,  by  death  alone,  ten  per  cent. ;  whereas  had  they  been  here  they 
would  have  increased  thirty  per  cent.  The  number  imported  into  that  one 
island  could  not  have  been  less  than  double  that  imported  into  this  Union, 
and  yet,  while  the  larger  number  is  at  this  day  represented  by  three  hundred 
thousand,  the  smaller  is  represented  by  almost  four  millions.  The  slave 
chapter  of  British  history  is  as  disgraceful  as  that  of  the  Union  is  honourable. 

That  slavery  even  yet  exists  among  us,  is  due  to  the  monopoly  system 
which  has  destroyed  the  value  of  land  in  Ireland,  India,  the  West  Indies, 
and  all  other  of  the  British  colonies,  and  yet  the  nation  by  which  that  sys- 
tem was  instituted  heads  the  crusade  against  slavery,  while  converting  the 
freemen  of  Ireland  and  India  into  slaves,  and  denouncing  the  planters,  at 
whose  expense  she  lives,  as  unworthy  to  be  received  into  the  society  of  free- 
born  Englishmen  ;  and  those  very  planters  are  united  in  the  support  of  the 
system  by  which  they  are  impoverished,  and  the  people  by  whom  they  are 
thus  denounced  ! 

The  following  article  on  the  position  and  prospects  of  the  cotton  trade, 
received  at  the  moment  that  the  above  was  in  the  press,  so  fully  confirms  the 
views  given  in  a  previous  chapter,  that  I  am  induced,  long  as  it  is,  to  reprint 
it  at  full  length.  It  is  from  the  London  Economist,^  the  highest  free-trade 
authority  in  Europe : 

«  The  quarters  whence  Great  Britain  draws  her  supply  of  raw  cotton  may  be  classed 
under  five  divisions :— -  North  America,  Brazil,  Egypt,  India,  and  Miscellaneous  Countries, 
chiefly  our  own  colonies.  On  the  increase  of  production  in  these  lands,  and  on  the  pro- 
portion of  that  increase  which  is  sent  to  this  country,  depends  our  capability  of  extending 
our  cotton  manufacture,  or  even  of  maintaining  it  at  its  present  level.  Let  us  therefore 
consider  each  of  these  sources  of  supply  in  turn,  that  we  may  be  able  to  form  a  fair  esti- 

*  Coleridge.     Six  Months  in  the  West  Indies.  j-  Dec.  1,  1849. 


170  THE   HARMONY  OF   INTERESTS. 

mate  of  our  expectations  from  each.     North  America,  as  the  most  i  jioortant,  we  will  leav« 
to  the  last. 

BRAZIL  is  the  chief  source  whence  we  draw  our  supply  of  long -stapled  cottons.  BrazU 
has  sent  us  as  follows : 

Brazil  Cotton. 

Bake  imported  in  five  rear*.  Bales  imported  per  anna». 

1830—1834,  inclusive  .  744,884  ....  148,977 
1835 — 1839  —  .  .  643,438  ....  128,687 
1840—1844  —  .  .  471,226  ....  94,245 

1845 — 1849      —         .         .         495,685         ....  99,137 

In  this  and  the  succeeding  tables  the  imports  for  1849  have  been  found  by  adding  tc 
the  known  imports  for  the  first  ten  months,  the  quantity  we  have  yet  reason  to  expect.  01 
that  which  ordinarily  arrives  in  November  and  December. 

From  Brazil,  therefore,  our  annual  supply  has  diminished  nearly  50,000  bales ;  or  if  we 
compare  the  two  extreme  years  of  the  series,  1830  and  1848,  the  falling  off  is  from 
192,267  bales  to  100,244,  or  92,000  bales. 

EOTPT. — Our  Egyptian  supply,  which  is  also  long-stapled  cotton,  has  ranged  as  fol 
lows : — 

Egyptian  Cotton. 

Bale*  Imported  In  five  yean.  Btla  imported  per  annum. 

1830—1834,  inclusive  .  99,899  ....  19,899 
1835—1839  —  .  .  173,031  .  .  .  .  34,608 
1840—1844  —  .  .  207,913  .  .  .  .  41,583 
1845 — 1849  —  .  .  224,579  .  .  .  .  44,918 

The  supply  from  Egypt,  however,  seems  to  have  reached  its  maximum  in  1845,  in 
whic^  year  we  received  81,344  bales.  This  year  it  does  not  reach  half  that  amount 
Moreover,  this  country,  from  the  peculiar  circumstances  of  its  government,  is  little  to  be 
relied  upon, — the  supply  having  varied  from  40,290  bales  in  1832  to  2,569  bales  ic 
1833;  and  again  from  18,245  bales  in  1842,  to  66,000  bales  in  1844. 

From  OTHZB  QUARTERS,  chiefly  the  West  Indies,  the  supply  has  been : — 

Miscellaneous. 

Bake  imported  In  fin  year*.  Balei  imported  per  annum. 

1830— 1834,  inclusive          .          68,873        ....  13,775 

1835—1839      —        .         .         161,369         ....  32,274 

1840—1844      —        .         .         117,887         ....  23,577 

1835—1849      —        .        .          44,833 8,966 

EAST  IICDIES.— Our  supply  from  this  quarter  varies  enormously,  from  90,000  to  270,000 
hales  per  annum,  inasmuch  as  we  only  receive  that  proportion  of  the  crop  which  our 
prices  may  divert  from  China  or  from  internal  consumption.  Our  imports  thence  have 
been  as  follows. 

East  India  Cotton. 

Bake  imported  in  nve  jean.  Bald  imported  per  annum. 

1830— 1834,  inclusive  .  403,976  ....  80,795 

1835—1839      —         .  .  723,263  ....  144,653 

1840—1844      —        .  .  1,167,294  ....  233,459 

1845—1849      —        .  .  899,213  .         .         .         .  179,852 

The  summary  of  our  supply  from  all  these  quarters  combined  is : — 

Summary. 

Import!  in  fits  nan.  Imports  per  annum. 

1830—1834,  inclusive         .       1,317,632         ....         263,526 
1835—1839     —         .         .       1,701,101         ....         340,220 
1840—1844     —         .         .       1,964,320         ....         392,864 
1845—1849     —        .         .       1,664,310         ....         332,862 
The  result  of  this  inquiry,  then  is,  that  our  average  annual  supply  from  all  quarters, 
except  the  United  States,  was  in  five  years  ending  1849  less  by  7,358  bales  than  in  the  five 
years  ending   1839,  and  less  by  60,000  bales  than  in  the  five  years  ending  1844.    Of  this 
diminished  supply,  moreover,  we  have  been  exporting  an  increasing  quantity,  viz : — 396,000 
bales  in  the  last  five  years,  against  342,000  b  lies  the  previous  five  years. 


THE  HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS.  171 

UJTITBB  STATES. — We  may  now  turn  our  attention  to  our  last  and  main  source  of  sup- 
ply, America,  which  has  sent  us : — 

American  Cotton. 

Import!  in  five  reart.  Imports  per  annum. 

1830 — 1834,  inclusive          .      3,241,958         ....         648,391 
1835 — 1839      —         .         .      4,308,610         ....         861,722 
1840—1844      —        .        .      5,802,829         ....      1,160,566 
1845—1849      —        .        .      6,188,144         ....      1,237,619 
The  last  five  years,  it  should  be  observed,  include  the  three  largest  crops  ever  known, 
one  very  deficient,  and  one  rather  so. 

It  is  a  known  and  admitted  fact  among  those  conversant  with  these  matters,  thai  a 
price  of  4d.  a  Ib.  for  middling  uplands,  laid  down  in  Liverpool,  leaves  sufficient  profit  to 
the  American  planter  to  induce  him  to  grow  as  much  cotton  as  his  negroes  can  gather ; 
and  that,  therefore,  as  the  average  price  has  scarcely  ever  ranged  so  low  as  this  for  any 
great  number  of  weeks,  the  possible  increase  of  the  crop  of  cotton  will  keep  pace  with  the 
actual  increase  of  the  Negro  population ;  and  cannot  do  more.  Now  the  negroes  increase 
at  a  very  regular  rate  of  3  per  cent,  per  annum.  If,  therefore,  these  premises  be  correct, 
it  will  follow  that  the  cotton  crop  of  each  year  will  surpass  that  of  each  preceding  year 
of  equally  favourable  conditions  (i.  «.,  as  to  good  planting  and  picking  weather,  late  frosts, 
freedom  from  worms,  inundations,  &c.)  by  3  per  cent.  Accordingly,  we  find  this  to  have 
been  pretty  closely  the  case,  as  the  following  tables  will  show.  The  years  1840,  1843, 
and  1845,  were  very  favourable  years  for  the  growth  and  gathering  of  cotton.  Let  us 
see  what  crop  each  of  these  years,  calculated  on  the  above  bases  (3  per  cent  yearly  in- 
crease,)  would  give  for  1849,  also  a  favourable  year: — 

Actual  crop.  Se.otjmn.  Percent  Estimated  crop  of  JStfl 

1840  .  .  2,178,000  .  .9  .  .27  .  2,866,000 
1843  .  .  2,379,000  .  .6  .  .18  .  2,807,220 
1845  .  .  2,394,000  .  .4  .  .12  .  2,681,280 

Average 2,784,833 


Actual  crop 2,730,000 

From  the  following  table  it  will  be  seen  that,  assuming  the  year  1838  as  a  starting 
point,  the  average  increase  of  the  American  crop  for  the  last  12  years  has  not  quite 
reached  3  per  cent. :  and  in  fact  wherein  for  any  short  series  of  years  this  rate  has  been 
exceeded,  it  has  been  attributable  simply  to  an  unusual  run  of  favourable  seasons 

Whit  the  crop  would  bare  been  with 

Te»r.  no  •itraordioarj  cuuiltni,  and  incnatinj  It  Actual  crop, 

tta  rat*  of  3  per  cent,  yttrly. 

1837—38  ...  ...  1,801,500 

1838—39  .  .  .  1,855,500  .  .  .  1,360,500 

1839—40  .  .  .  1,911,200  .  .  .  2,178,000 

1840—41  .  .  .  1,968,500  .  .  .  1,635,000 

1841—42  .  .  .  2,027,500  .  .  .  1,083,500 

1842—43  .  .  .  2,088,300  .  .  .  2,379,000 

1843—44  .  .  .  2,151,000  .  .  .  2,030,500 

1844—45  .  .  .  2,215,000  .  .  .  2,394,500 

1845—46  .  .  .  2,282,000  .  .  .  2,100,500 

1846 — 17  .  .  .  2,350,500  .  .  .  1,778,500 

1847—48  .  .  2,421,000  .  .  .  2,347,500 

1848 — +y  .  .  .  2,493,000  .  .  .  2,728,500 

1849—50  .  .  .  2,568,300  .  .  .  2,350,000  estimated 

Average         .         .         .         2,194,400         .         .         .         2,080,500 
It  is  clear,  then,  that  we  shall  be  sufficiently  near  the  mark  for  any  practical  conclu- 
sions, if  we  assume  the  average  increase  of  the  American  cotton  crop  at  3  per  cent  per 
annum,  barring  any  unusual  freedom  from,  or  occurrence  of,  disasters,  such  as  sometimes 
happen.     Let  us  new  inquire  what  proportion  of  this  increase  will  fall  to  our  share. 

The  consumption  of  the  United  States  itself  has  been  steadily  on  tho  advance,  and 
now  increases  at  an  average  annual  rate  of  about  35,000  bales.  It  is  now  about  520,000 
bales  yearly.  That  of  the  continent  now  reaches  (of  American  cotton)  about  700,000 
bales.  America  and  the  continent,  therefore,  require  about  1,200,000  bales  at  present, 
»nd  will  require  more  each  year.  Moreover,  they  will  always  take  precedence  of  Great 


172  THE   HARMONY  OF   INTERESTS. 


Britain,  as  their  margin  of  profit  is  larger,  and  a  small  increase  of  price  is  of  less  conte- 
quence  to  their  manufacturers  than  to  ours,  and  checks  consumption  less.  The  following 
table  will  throw  much  light  on  this  question  : 

Crop  of  Import  of  American  cotton    Export  of  American  cot-    American  cotton  retained 

5  Yean.  American  cotton.  into  Great  Britain.  ton  from  Great  Britain.       for  home  consumption. 

1840 — 44         .         9,905,638         .         5,802,829         .         295,600         .         5,507,229 
1845 — 49         .       11,349,921         .         6,188,144         .         596,640         .         5,591,504 

Increase         .          1,444,283         .  385,315         .         301,040         .  84,275 

From  this  table  it  appears,  that,  while  the  growth  of  American  cotton  in  the  last  five 
years  exceeded  that  of  the  previous  five  by  the  unprecedented  quantity  of  nearly  one 
million  and  a  half  of  bales,  of  this  increase  only  385,000  reached  this  country,  and  of 
this  we  had  to  re-export  more  than  three-fourths,  leaving  an  annual  increase  available  for  home 
consumption  of  only  17,000  bales.  For  any  augmentation  of  consumption  beyond  this, 
we  have  been  drawing  on  our  stocks. 

We  will  now  bring  into  one  view  the  whole  supply  and  the  whole  consumption  of  all 
kinds  of  cotton  in  Great  Britain  during  the  last  ten  years : 


Ton. 

BilM  im. 
ported  from  all 
quarto*. 

Bales 
exported. 

Retained 
for  home  con* 

lumptioa. 

Supply  for 
home  coniumpt'n 

annually. 

Actual  con- 
coiuumption 
annually. 

Actual  con- 
coniumpt'n 
weekly. 

1840—44 
1845  —  49 

7,767,149 
7,852,454 

637,650 
992,850 

7,129,499 
6,859,604 

•  1,425,900 
1,371,920 

1,290,480 
1,477,360  • 

24,810 

28,410 

Increase  85,305        355,200 186,880          3,600 

Decrease       ~!        ~     .        .        .        269,895  53,980 

We  have  taken  the  actual  consumption  of  1849  at  1,650,000  bales  only,  for  reasons 
hereafter  stated. 

Now,  bearing  in  mind  that  the  figures  in  the  above  tables  are,  with  scarcely  an  exception,  ascer- 
tained facts,  and  not  estimates,  let  us  sum  the  conclusions  to  which  they  have  conducted 
us ;  conclusions  sufficient,  if  not  to  alarm  us,  yet  certainly  to  create  much  uneasiness,  and 
to  suggest  great  caution  on  the  part  of  all  concerned,  directly  or  indirectly,  in  the  great 
manufacture  of  England. 

1.  That  our  supply  of  cotton  from  miscellaneous  quarters  (excluding  the  United  States) 
has  for  many  years  been  decidedly,  though  irregularly,  decreasing. 

2.  That  our  supply  of  cotton  from  all  quarters,  (including  the  United  States,)  available 
for  home  consumption,  has  of  late  years  been  falling  off  at  the  rate  of  1,000  bales  a  week, 
while  our  consumption  has  been  increasing  during  the  same  period  at  the  rate  of  3,600 
bales  a  week. 

3.  That  the  United  States  is  the  only  country  where  the  growth  of  cotton  is  on  the 
increase ;  and  that  there  eVen  the  increase  does  not  on  an  average  exceed  3  per  cent.,  or 
80,000  bales  annually,  which  is  barely  sufficient  to  supply  the  increasing  demand  for  its 
own  consumption,  and  for  the  continent  of  Europe. 

4.  That  no  stimulus  of  price  can  materially  augment  this  annual  increase,  as  the  plant- 
ers always  grow  as  much  cotton  as  the  negro  population  can  pick. 

5.  That,  consequently,  if  the  cotton  manufacture  of  Great  Britain  is  to  increase  at  all, 
on  its  present  footing,  it  can  only  be  enabled  to  do  so  by  applying  a  gieat  stimulus  to  the 
growth  of  cotton  in  other  countries  adapted  for  the  culture. 

Within  the  memory  of  many  now  living,  a  great  change  has  taken  place  in  the  coun- 
tries from  which  our  main  bulk  of  cotton  is  procured.  In  the  infancy  of  the  manufac- 
ture, our  chief  supply  came  from  the  Mediterranean,  especially  from  Smyrna  and  Malta. 
Neither  of  the  places  now  sends  us  more  than  a  few  chance  bags  occasionally.  In  the 
last  century,  the  West  Indies  were  our  principal  source;  in  the  year  1786,  out  of 
20,000,000  Ibs.  imported,  5,000,000  came  from  Smyrna,  and  the  rest  from  the  West 
Indies;  in  1848,  the  West  Indies  sent  us  only  about  1,300  bales;  in  1781,  Brazil  began 
to  send  us  cotton,  and  the  supply  thence  continued  to  increase,  though  irregularly,  till 
1830,  since  which  time  it  has  fallen  off  to  one-half.  About  1822,  Egyptian  cotton  began 
to  come  in  considerable  quantities,  its  cultivation  having  been  introduced  into  that  coun- 
try two  years  before.  The  import  exceeded  80,000  bales  in  1845;  the  average  of 
the  last  three  years  has  not  been  a  third  of  that  quantity.  Cotton  has  always  been  grown 
largely  in  Hindostan ;  but  it  did  not  send  much  to  England  till  about  thirty  years  ago. 
In  the  five  years  ending  1824,  the  yearly  average  import  was  33,500  bales ;  in  1841,  it 
leache  1  274,000,  and  may  now  be  roughly  estimated  at  200,000  bales  a  yeat. 


THE   HARMONY  OF   INTERESTS.  173 

Now,  what  is  the  reason  why  these  countries,  after  having  at  one  time  produced  so 
largely  and  so  well,  should  have  ceased  or  curtailed  their  growth  within  recent  years  * 
It  is  clearly  a  question  of  price.  Let  us  consider  a  few  of  the  cases  : 


At  the  cloje  price  of          per.  price  of  per  price  of  per  price  of 

Mar 


Lowest 
price  of 
of  the  yean  Pernambuco.        ct.          Maranham.         ct  Egyptian. 

1836—39  inclusive       9$rf.       —  8$d.        —          10$d.        —          4£rf.  — 

1840—43  7  5f  7—3$ 

1844  —  48  5$          36  4J          42  5J  43          2|  40 

Here,  surely,  may  be  read  the  explanation  of  the  deplorable  falling  off  in  our  miscel- 
laneous supply.  From  the  four  years  ending  1839,  when  the  great  stimulus  was  given 
which  procured  us  so  ample  a  supply  during  the  succeeding  period,  to  the  quinquennial 
period  ending  1848,  there  has  been  a  fall  in  price,  on  an  average,  of  40  per  cent.  Un- 
less, therefore,  we  assume  either  an  enormous  margin  of  profit  in  the  earlier  period,  or  an 
extreme  diminution  in  the  cost  of  producing  the  article  of  late  years,  such  a  fall  in  price 
would  be  quite  sufficient  to  direct  capital  and  industry  into  other  channels,  and  to  prevent 
so  bulky  an  article  as  cotton  from  being  gro\vn  or  forwarded. 

In  both  Brazil  and  India,  freight  and  carriage  form  an  inordinate  proportion  of  the 
pnce  of  cotton.  In  both  countries  the  bales  are  carried  great  distances  on  the  backs 
of  mules  or  other  beasts  of  burden.  The  deficiency  of  good  roads,  convenient  vehi- 
cles, and  safely  navigable  rivers,  in  the  cotton  districts  of  both  countries,  swells  the 
expense  of  bringing  the  bales  to  the  shipping  ports  to  such  an  extent,  that,  when  prices 
are  low  in  England,  the  ultimate  net  remittance  to  the  planter  is  quite  insufficient  to  re- 
pay the  cost  of  growing,  picking,  and  packing.  In  some  years,  the  price  of  much  of  the 
Surat  cotton  sent  to  this  country  was  so  low  as  only  to  remit  one  penny  a  pound  to  the 
shipper  at  Bombay}  and  by  the  time  this  reached  the  actual  grower,  it  had  probably 
dwindled  away,  through  the  expenses  of  carriage,  to  a  sum  inadequate  even  to  pay  the 
government  rent.  Our  supply  from  both  these  countries  will  depend  entirely  upon  price. 
In  Brazil,  where  we  believe  the  sugar  cultivation  is  less  profitable  than  formerly,  a  range 
of  prices  50  per  cent,  higher  than  those  of  the  last  few  years  would  probably  induce  the 
planters  to  increase  their  cotton  grounds,  and  would  repay  them  for  so  doing.  In  regard  to 
the  East  Indies,  where  large  quantities  are  always  grown,  our  supply  thence  depends  upon 
two  things  —  first,  the  demand  for  China,  which  is  usually  supplied  before  Great  Britain  ; 
and,  secondly,  on  the  question  whether  the  net  price  at  Bombay  or  Madras  will  pay  for 
picking,  cleaning,  packing,  and  transporting  to  the  coast.  Under  the  stimulus  of  high  prices, 
(such  as  prevail  at  this  moment,)  large  quantities,  would,  we  doubt  not,  be  sent  forward  ; 
and  the  price  that  will  be  requisite  t^  secure  such  large  supplies  will  diminish  as  the 
means  of  carriage  are  increased  and  cheapened.  If  the  prices  of  the  last  five  years 
continue,  we  believe  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  the  supply  will  inevitably  continue  to 
fall  off. 

We  do  not,  however,  participate  in  the  sanguine  expectations  which  many  parties  en- 
tertain, that  even  with  higher  prices  the  quantity  and  quality  of  East  Indian  cotton  sent 
to  this  country  can  progress  so  rapidly  as  to  render  us  at  all  independent  of  the  Ameri- 
can supply.  For,  in  the  first  place,  the  absence  of  good  roads  or  navigable  rivers  in  the 
cotton  districts,  the  length  of  time  and  expenditure  of  capital  needed  before  the  want  of 
those  can  be  supplied  by  the  establishment  of  railroads,  and  the  languid  and  unenterpris- 
ing character  of  the  people,  must  necessarily  cause  any  material  increase  of  supply  (at 
least  over  250,000  bales  per  annum)  to  be  a  matter  of  very  slow  and  costly  operation. 
And,  in  the  second  place,  the  quality  of  the  cotton  grown  in  India  is  peculiar  ;  and  this 
peculiarity  is  still  traceable,  though  in  a  modified  degree,  in  whatever  locality  and  from 
whatever  seed  the  plant  is  grown,  even  in  the  best  specimens  (improved  a?  they  unques- 
tionably are)  which  have  of  late  been  sent  to  this  country;  and  this  peculiarity  will 
always  we  fear,  prevent  it  from  being  substitutable  for  American  cotton,  except  to  a  very 
limited  extent. 

Our  hopes  lie  in  a  very  different  direction  ;  we  look  to  our  West  Indian,  African,  and 
Australian  colonies,  as  the  quarters  from  which,  would  government  only  afford  every 
possible  facility,  (we  ask  and  wish  for  no  more,)  we  might,  ere  long,  draw  such  a  supply 
of  cotton  as  would,  to  say  the  least,  make  the  fluctuations  of  the  American  crop,  and  the 
varying  proportion  of  it  which  falls  to  our  share,  of  far  less  consequence  to  our  pros- 
perity than  they  now  are. 

The  West  Indies,  as  we  have  already  seen,  used  to  send  us,  sixty  years  ago,  about 
40,000  bales,  or  three-fourths  of  our  then  supply.  But  the  enormous  profits  realized  on 


174  THE   HARMONY  OF  INTERESTS. 


the  growth  of  sugar,  partly  caused,  and  much  prolonged,  by  our  prohibitory  duties  on  all 
competing  sugars,  directed  the  attention  of  the  colonists  exclusively  in  that  direction.  As 
in  the  analogous  case  of  protected  wheat  in  this  country,  other  cultivation  was  gradually 
abandoned  in  favour  of  a  single  article  ;  the  cane  was  grown  in  soils  and  localities  utterly 
unfit  for  it,  and  into  which  nothing  but  the  protective  system  could  have  forced  it,  and 
cotton  was  soon  altogether  neglected.  Many  parts  of  the  West  Indies,  St.  Vincent  espe- 
cially, which  are  worst  adapted  for  the  cane,  are  the  best  adapted  for  the  cotton  plant, 
which  flourishes  in  light  and  dry  soils,  and  especially  near  the  sea-coast.  The  artificial 
stimulus  which  our  mistaken  policy  so  long  applied  to  sugar  cultivation,  having  been 
withdrawn,  it  must  be  abandoned  in  all  unsuitable  localities,  and  would  be  well  replaced 
by  cotton.  What  price  would  be  required  to  repay  its  culture  thers,  we  cannot  say ; 
but  considering  at  how  small  a  cost  it  might  be  placed  on  ship  lioard  in  all  these 
colonies,  and  how  large  a  portion  this  item  generally  forms  of  the  whole  expense 
of  production,  we  cannot  see  why  cotton  should  not  be  grown  in  the  Antilles  as 
cheaply  as  in  the  United  States,  if  only  the  negroes  can  be  relied  upon  for  steady  and 
continuous  labour  during  the  picking  season.  Now,  the  price  of  West  Indian  cotton 
ranges  higher  than  that  of  the  bulk  of  the  American  crop,  as  being  longer  in  staple.  Our 
belief  is,  that  were  the  attention  of  our  planters  once  energetically  directed  to  this  article, 
they  might  soon  send  us  a  regular  supply  of  100,000  bales  per  annum,  and  thus  find  a 
use  for  many  estates  that  must  otherwise  b*  abandoned. 

The  experiment  of  cotton  growing  has  already  been  tried  with  success  in  one  of  our  most 
hopeful  African  colonies — Port  Natal.  We  have  already  received  above  100  bales  from 
this  colony — the  main  portion  of  which  consists  of  the  indigenous  cotton,  very  similar  to 
that  shipped  from  New  Orleans,  clean,  fine,  tenacious,  but  of  a  light  brown  colour.  On 
the  whole,  it  is  a  most  admirable  article  for  ordinary  purposes,  and  worth  in  the  market 
to-day  nearly  Id.  per  pound.  The  remainder  of  the  shipments  have  been  grown  from 
the  sea-island  seed,  and  are  of  excellent  quality.  The  cultivation  is  rapidly  increasing., 
and  about  500  bales  are  expected  next  year  from  the  colony.  A  society  has  been  formed 
for  promoting  emigration  thither,  and  a  ship  full  of  emigrants  sailed  a  few  days  since. 
Mr.  Byrne,  the  agent,  says : 

«  Natal  is  situated  in  a  sunny  and  bright  region.  It  has  iron,  lead,  coal,  and  copper  in 
abundance,  and  with  British  industry  might  be  made  one  of  the  finest  and  wealthiest 
countries  on  the  globe.  The  country  is  admirably  calculated  for  the  growth  of  cotton, 
some  of  which  is  of  a  superior  description.  In  America,  cotton  was  chiefly  cultivated 
by  slave-labour  at  a  cost  of  about  351.  a  year  for  each  slave ;  whereas  at  Natal  the  labour 
of  the  Zooloos  could  be  purchased  at  a  cost  of  10«.  a  month ;  and  Natal  too,  from  its 
proximity  to  the  sea,  was  most  advantageously  situated  for  carrying  on  the  trade  with 
England  in  competition  with  the  States.  I  would  not  advise  you  to  cultivate  sugar ;  you 
will  be  able  to  get  that  article  perhaps  better  from  the  Mauritius,  where  you  will  find  a 
highly  remunerative  market  for  all  agricultural  produce.  I  intend  in  the  beginning  of  the 
year  to  send  out  a  screw  steamer  to  run  to  and  from  that  island  and  Natal." 

From  Australia  we  have  as  yet  had  no  bulk  of  supply,  but  several  acres  are  under 
cultivation,  and  the  samples  sent  are  of  so  fine  a  quality  as  to  prove  beyond  question  the 
adaptation  of  the  soil  and  climate  for  the  production  of  as  good  an  article  as  any  grown 
in  America.  We  have  now  lying  before  us,  along  with  the  Port  Natal  cotton,  samples 
of  some  grown  from  sea-island  seed  at  Bolwarra,  in  New  South  Wales,  near  Maitland, 
about  80  miles  north  of  Sydney.  It  is  long,  fine,  and  silky. 

We  believe  that,  under  due  encouragement,  the  cultivation  of  cotton  in  these  quarters 
might  increase  in  a  steady  ratio  equal  to  our  increasing  demand.  Let  us  now  see,  on  a 
•ummary,  how  the  matter  stands. 

We  have  seen  that  of  the  American  cotton  crop,  our  annual  supply  during  the  last  five 
years  has  nearly  reached  1,120,000  bales,  and  that,  the  yearly  increase  of  the  crop  being  ba- 
lanced by  the  yearly  increasing  demand  for  the  United  States  and  for  the  continent,  there  is  little 
probability  of  our  ever  getting  more  than  this  on  an  average.  Let  us  suppose  that  a  due 
advance  in  price  raises  the  production  of  Brazil  to  what  it  had  attained  in  1830,  and  that 
of  India  nearly  to  what  it  was  in  1841,  and  that  Egypt  and  our  own  colonies  will  again 
•end  us  some  appreciable  and  increasing  imports  : 

B«]M  per  •nnnm. 

United  States .  say     1,200,000 

Brazil 200,000 

India 250,000 

Egypt 50,000 

Our  colonies 50,000 

1,750,000 


THE  HARMONY  OF  INTERESTS.  175 

This  would  allow  us  a  supply  of  33,500  bales  a  week,  the  apparent  consumption  of 
this  year.  For  any  addition  to  this  we  must  depend  on  the  increase  of  tne  colonial  sup- 
ply, or  on  that  which  a  still  higher  range  of  prices  will  enable  us  to  wr.'.,g  out  of  India 
and  Brazil.  The  conclusion  from  the  whole  clearly  is,  that,  in  order  to  secure  such  a 
supply  of  the  raw  material  as  is  needed  to  meet  our  own  present  consumotjon.  we  mutt 
be  prepared  to  pay  a  decidedly  higher  range  of  prices  than  hat  of  late  yean  obtainea ;  that,  in  fact, 
the  average  prices  of  the  last  five  years  have  proved  quite  inadequate,  in  spite  of  large 
cropp  in  America,  to  draw  to  this  country  sufficient  cotton  to  enable  our  acraal  machinery 
o  work  full  time.  Higher  prices,  therefore,  must  obtain  in  future  ;  nor  snould  spinners 
and  manufacturers  wish  it  otherwise ;  for  experience  has  fuJJy  shown  them  that  no  cir- 
cumstances can  cause  them  so  great  or  so  certain  a  loss  as  an  inadequate  supply  of  die 
raw  material,  and  higher  prices  can  alone  avert  this  supreme  eviL 

So  much  as  to  the  probable  sufficiency  of  the  supply  of  the  raw  material  to  this  coun- 
try, on  the  supposition  that  the  consumption  it  what  it  appeart  to  be,  and  will  continue  what  it  it. 
But  are  we  justified  in  these  two  assumptions  ?  Let  us  put  together  a  few  facts  which 
bear  upon  the  question. 

And,  first,  let  us  ascertain  what  the  actual  consumption  has  been  during  the  last  ten 
years.  We  know  this  with  accuracy  for  nine  years,  and  for  the  first  ten  months  of  this 
year.  During  these  ten  months,  the  deliveries  to  'he  trade  have  reached  1,495,000  bales. 
But  we  know  that,  during  the  latter  portion  of  this  period,  manufacturers  have  been  pur- 
chasing far  more  than  they  need  for  actual  use,  and  that,  while  the  actual  quantity  worked 
up  has,  in  consequence  "of  a  general  tendency  towards  the  production  of  finer  fabrics, 
been  decreasing  since  the  beginning  of  June,  the  purchases  of  cotton  have  been  increating, 
till,  in  October,  they  reached  the  unprecedented  amount  of  217,000  bales.  A  lull  has 
now  taken  place,  and  we  believe  we  shall  not  be  far  wrong  in  assuming  that  the  pur- 
chases of  the  trade,  during  the  last  nine  weeks  of  this  year,  will  not  exceed  205,000 
bales ;  and  that,  iu  that  case,  they  will  hold  at  the  end  of  the  year  50,000  bales  more 
than  usual  in  stock.  This  would  give  the  consumption  of  the  year  at  1,650,000  bales. 
Our  own  impression  is,  that  this  estimate  is  rather  over  than  under  the  mark,  and  that 
spinners  hold  a  larger  stock  than  we  assume ;  but,  in  any  case  we  cannot  be  sufficiently 
wide  of  the  truth  to  affect  our  conclusions. 

Weekly  c'njumpticn  of  Weekly  coniumption  of 

Y»r.  cotton  in  Great  Britain,  i  Tttr.  cotton  in  Greal  Britain. 


1840  .    .    .    .  24,868 

1841  ....  22,134 

1842  .    .    .    .  22,949 

1843  ....  26,693 

1844  ....  27,439 


1845  .    .       .  30,120 

1846  .    .    .    .  30,000 

1847  ....  21,270 

1848  ....  28,950 

1849  ....  31,730 


Now,  we  wish  our  readers  to  consider  this  table  carefully,  and  notice  the  extraordinary 
fluctuations  in  the  quantity  of  cotton  worked  up  each  year,  in  connection  with  the  facts  we 
are  about  to  state.  The  weekly  average  fell  nearly  3,000  bales  from  1840  to  1841 ;  then 
jumped  up  nearly  4,000  bales  from  1842  to  1843;  in  1845  'and  1846,  it  remained  sta- 
tionary at  a  high  figure ;  and  (passing  over  for  obvious  reasons  the  anomalous  year  of 
1847)  it  had  again  fallen  in  1848,  when  the  quantity  only  exceeded  that  of  eight  years 
prtv;uu?ly  by  4,000  bales.  Yet,  during  tlie  whole  of  this  period,  the  machinery  engaged  in  tht 
cotton  manufacture  was  constantly,  though  not  regularly,  increasing ;  and,  except  for  a  short 
period  in  1842,  (and  in  1847,  which  last  year  we  have  thrown  out  of  our  calculation,) 
the  mills  were,  we  believe  we  are  correct  in  stating,  all  at  full  work.  Indeed,  "  short 
time"  is  attended  with  too  tremendous  a  loss  to  the  mill-owner  ever  to  be  resorted  to,  ex- 
cept under  the  direst  pressure.  During  the  last  year,  we  see  the  consumption  has  in- 
creased nearly  3,000  bales  a  week,  though  the  hours  of  labour  have  been  reduced,  by 
legislative  enactment,  from  eleven  to  ten  per  diem. 

All  these  considerations  point  clearly  to  the  conclusion,  that  our  consumption  of  the  raw 
material  is  not  a  fixed,  but  a  varying  quantity,  and  is  affected  by  some  other  causes  than 
either  the  amount  of  machinery  in  operation,  or  the  hours  during  which  it  is  employed. 
What  this  cause  is,  and  the  extent  to  which  it  is  capable  of  operating,  we  can  be  at  no 
loss  to  discover. 

The  weight  of  raw  cotton  consumed  by  a  given  amount  of  machinery  varies  according 
to  the  nature  of  the  article  produced.  We  produce  in  England  fabrics  of  which  the  raw 
material  forms  two-thirds  of  the  value,  and  fabrics  of  which  it  forms  not  one-fiftiefh  of  the 
value.  We  spin  yarns  of  which  the  raw  materials  cost  three-fourths,  and  yarns  of  which 
it  costs  one-twentieth,  of  the  finished  price.  We  have  spindles  that  produce  two  poundi 
rf  yam  a  week,  and  spindles  that  do  not  produce  two  pounds  a  quarter.  But,  wimont 


176  THE   HARMONY  OF  INTERESTS. 

going  to  these  extreme  varieties,  we  will  here  copy  a  statement  made  by  Messrs.  Du  Fay 
&  Company  in  their  monthly  circular,  the  accuracy  of  which  we  can  fully  confirm. 
They  say : 

840  spindles,  working  20's  twist,  will  consume  1,340  Ibs.  of  cotton 
840       «  «         30's    «'        "          "  840          « 

840       «  "          40's     «         "          "  525  « 

840       "  «          60's     •«.-••  224  « 

Now,  though  machinery  accustomed  to  produce  No.  20's  cannot  produce  No.  60's,  yet 
it  can,  without  material  change  or  difficulty,  produce  No.  30's ;  and  machinery  adapted 
for  No.  30's  can  change  to  No.  40's,  and  so  on.  In  fact,  every  mill  has  a  range  of  at  least 
ten  numbers,  by  varying  which  it  can  reduce  or  augment  its  consumption  of  cotton  easily 
from  25  to  50  per  cent.  The  same  may  be  said  of  weaving  mills.  In  many  mills,  looms 
may  be  seen  working  side  by  side  of  the  same  construction,  some  of  which  produce  60  Ibs. 
a  week,  and  others  only  25  Ibs.  We  could  mention  at  least  one  mill  where  the  amount 
of  raw  cotton  worked  up  weekly  varies,  according  to  the  fineness  of  the  article  produced, 
to  meet  the  fluctuating  demands  of  the  market,  from  30,000  Ibs.  to  18,000 Ibs.;  and  we 
find  in  the  Manchester  Guardian  of  last  Saturday  the  following  corroborative  statement : 

"  Some  idea  of  what  a  change  of  numbers  wil\  effect  may  be  gathered  from  the  fol- 
lowing instances ;  the  names  of  the  firms  are  before  us : 

Previous  weekly. 
Reduction.  consumption. 

No.  1 10,000  Ibs.  out  of  40,000  Ibs. 

No.  2 18,000  Ibs.    —     60,000  Ibs. 

No.  3 2  5,000  Ibs.    —   11 5,000  Ibs. 

No.  4        .......       10,000  Ibs.    —     30,000  Ibs. 

No.  5 10,000  Ibs.    —     30,000  Ibs. 

No.  6 70  bis.     —  120  bales. 

We  have  been  informed  by  another  very  extensive  spinner,  that  the  reduction  in  his  esta 
blishment  is  more  than  40,000  Ibs.  per  week." 

It  is  not  easy  to  ascertain  the  extent  to  which  this  change  from  coarser  to  finer  numbers 
is  actually  carried  at  any  particular  period.  We  know,  however,  that  it  does  go  on  to  a 
very  great  extent,  and  has  done  so,  perhaps  almost  unprecedentedly,  during  the  last  six 
months;  and,  when  we  consider  the  immense  proportion  of  the  weight  of  cotton  used  in 
England,  which  is  consumed  by  the  makers  of  heavy  cloths  and  coarse  yarns,  we  think 
we  may  safely  affirm  that  a  brisk  demand  for  printers,  shirtings,  and  India  yarns  on  the 
one  hand,  with  a  dull  demand  for  domestics,  long-cloths,  and  German  yarns  on  the  other, 
or  a  reversal  of  these  conditions  of  the  market,  if  continued  for  any  time,  will  make  a 
difference  of  at  least  25  per  cent,  in  the  weight  of  raw  cotton  consumed. 

Now,  an  advance  in  the  price  of  cotton  is  much  more  strongly  felt  in  the  coarser  yarns 
and  the  heavier  cloths  than  in  the  finer  ones.  An  advance,  such  as  has  taken  place  in 
the  last  twelve  months,  of  nearly  3d.  per  Ib.  on  the  raw  material  of  a  stout  calico  which 
ordinarily  sells  in  the  finished  state,  at  8d.  per  Ib.  is  nearly  40  per  cent,  on  the  manufac- 
tured article.  On  a  printing  cloth,  or  a  fine  shirting,  which  sells  at  12rf.  per  Ib.  it 
is  only  25  per  cent. ;  and  on  the  piece  when  printed,  it  is  far  less  than  this — in  fact  a  mere 
trifle.  Or,  to  put  it  in  a  still  clearer  light,  an  advance  of  3d.  per  Ib.  on  a  heavy  domestic 
calico,  will  compel  the  purchaser  to  pay  4d.  where  he  formerly  only  paid  3d.  per  yard. 
The  same  3d.  per  Ib.  will  be  15rf.  on  a  piece  of  printing  cloth  30  yards  in  length,  which, 
when  printed,  sells  in  the  shops  at  about  12s.  6d. ;  in  other  words,  it  will  raise  the  price 
to  the  customer  from  Sd.  to  5$rf.  per  yard.  Now,  this  advance,  which  is  only  ten  per 
cent.,  is  not  sufficient  materially  or  rapidly  to  check  consumption ;  the  other  advance, 
which  is  40  per  cent,  is.  It  is  clear,  therefore,  that  an  advance  in  the  price  of  the  raw 
material  will  check  the  demand  for,  and  consequently  the  production  of,  heavy  fabrics, 
much  sooner  and  more  decidedly  than  that  of  light  ones.  Accordingly,  as  the  following 
table  will  show,  the  range  of  prices  is  more  limited  in  the  former  than  in  the  latter ;  and 
never  keeps  pace  with,  or  nearly  so,  that  of  the  raw  material : — 

Price  per  Ib.  of  the  following  articles  in  November.  Eitreme 

1845.         1846.         1847.        1848.          1»49.         range. 
d  d.  d  d.  d.  d. 

Raw  cotton,  fair  uplands                                        4$         6  5|  4         6$         2£ 

No.  20's  water  twist,  good  seconds                        9           8J-  7|  6$       8$         2j 

No.  40's  mule  twist,  fair  seconds                         10           9J  8^  7         9£         3 

Stout  domestics,  18$  Ibs.  for  60  yds.                     9$         9}  9£  8         s|         1$ 

Medium  domestics,  12  Ibs.  for  60  yds.        .       11$       11J  9|  9£     10          2$ 

Printing  cloths,  27  in.  72  reed,  5  Ibs.  2  oz.  .       13         isj  12J  10£     14}         3$ 

It  is  obvious  from  this  table  that  while  printing  cloths  have  a  range  of  price  even 

exceeding  that  of  raw  cotton,  and  find  no  difficulty,  where  there  is  a  reasonably  brisk 


THE   HARMONY  OF   INTERESTS.  177 


trade,  in  following  its  fluctuations,  the  very  reverse  is  the  case  with  heavy  domestics,  into 
which  a  very  disproportionate  bulk  of  the  raw  material  is  worked  up,  when  compared 
with  the  machinery  employed.  For  these  last-mentioned  articles  there  is  a  very  extensive 
demand  at  low  prices;  but  with  any  material  advance,  this  demand  immediately  falls  off. 
A  great  proportion  of  them  is  exported  in  the  form  of  T  cloths  and  long-cloths  to  Por- 
tugal, the  Mediterranean,  and  the  Levant,  as  long  as  prices  range  about  Sd.  a  Ib. — when 
it  approaches  9d.  this  export  is  almost  wholly  suspended,  and  the  manufacturers  who 
ordinarily  supply  it,  are  compelled  to  turn  their  attention  to  other  fabrics. 

Another  cause  contributes  to  this  change.  In  unprofitable  years,  such  as  always  occur 
when  the  raw  material  is  deficient  in  quantity  and  has  rapidly  become  enhanced  in 
value,  (as  in  the  present  year,)  every  manufacturer  is  of  course  anxious  both  to  minimize  his 
loss,  and  to  make  his  capital  go  as  far,  and  last  as  long,  as  he  can.  It  is  evident  that  this 
will  be  best  effected  by  turning  his  machinery  to  the  finest  range  of  numbers  it  is  fitted 
to  produce,  and  working  up  (say)  20,000  Ibs.  instead  of  30,000  Ibs.  of  cotton  weekly. 
Moreover,  in  years  when  trade  is  dull,  and  when  manufacturers,  from  inability  to  sell, 
are  compelled  to  accumulate  stocks,  the  same  inducement  to  produce  as  fine  fabrics  as 
possible  is  still  more  strongly  felt.  A  manufacturer  with  500  looms  on  light  printing 
cloths  can  afford  to  hold  a  stock  of  50,000  pieces,  or  four  months'  production,  but  a  manu- 
facturer with  500  looms  must  have  a  much  larger  capital  who  can  afford  to  hold  25,000 
pieces,  or  four  months'  production  of  heavy  domestics.  In  round  numbers,  the  first  would 
have  12,000/.  and  the  second  18,000/.  locked  up. 

From  a  combination  of  all  the  above  considerations — from  observing  that  this  change 
from  coarser  to  finer  fabrics  lias  oAen  occurred  in  the  past — from  knowing  how  easily, 
and  to  what  an  extent,  it  may  be  effected — and  from  perceiving  the  vast  inducement 
which  such  a  rise  in  the  value  of  cotton  as  has  recently  occurred  offers  to  this  change — 
we  feel  no  doubt  that  such  change  has,  during  the  last  six  months,  been  carried  to  a  far 
greater  extent  than  is  generally  estimated;  and  we  question  whether  the  actual  con- 
sumption is  at  this  moment  within  5000  bales  per  week  of  what  it  appeared  to  be  in  May 
last,  nor  within  3000  of  what  it  actually  was.  We  feel  convinced,  too,  that  with  our 
present  and  future  prospects  as  to  the  supply  and  price  of  the  raw  material,  as  developed 
in  the  early  part  of  this  paper,  our  manufacture  must  run  more  than  it  has  done  of  late 
years  upon  the  finer  yarns  and  fabrics,  and  consequently  that  our  consumption  of  cotton 
(till  the  supply  from  miscellaneous  quarters  has  been  greatly  augmented)  must  tend  to 
decrease  rather  than  otherwise,  notwithstanding  the  increase  and  improvement  of  ma- 
chinery ;  that  (to  sum  up  the  whoie)  those  speculators  who  refuse  to  believe  in  a  diminished 
consumption,  and  those  manufaciurertrcho  refuse  to  face  the  fact  of  an  inadequate  supply,  will  find 
themselves  equally  in  error,  and  in  danger.  We  particularly  call  the  attention  of  the  latter 
parties  to  the  consideration  that  the  better  or  worse  accounts  of  the  coming  American 
crop  in  no  degree  affect  our  argument.  We  have  assumed  it  at  2,350,000  bales— the 
highest  estimate  being  2,400.000  bales. 

There  are  yet  other  reflections  which  tend  to  corroborate  this  conclusion.  We  are  not 
without  indications  that  we  have  over-eetimated  and  outrun  the  demand  for  the  manufac- 
tured article  from  our  existing  markets,  as  much  as  we  have  outrun  the  supply  of  the  raw 
material  from  existing  sources.  It  is  probable  that  the  world's  requirement  of  cotton 
goods  about  keeps  pace  with  the  world's  growth  of  cotton  wool.  But  unfortunately  om 
machinery  has  increased  faster  than  either.  We  can  produce  more  calico  than  is  wanted, 
and  we  can  consume  more  cotton  than  is  grown.  We  think  that,  in  endeavouring 
to  ascertain  this,  we  may  safely  take  the  data  of  the  last  five  years  as  our  basis,  since, 
though  the  demand  for  our  manufactures  has  in  that  period  been  checked  by  a  tremen- 
dous political  and  commercial  convulsion,  yet  on  the  other  hand  it  has  been  increased 
during  a  portion  of  that  time  by  an  unexampled  expenditure  among  the  working  classes, 
(in  the  form  of  wages  to  railway  labourers  and  others,)  and  the  supply  has  been  checked 
oy  one  of  the  most  deficient  cotton  crops  known  for  many  years. 

We  have  constructed  the  following  tables  with  the  greatest  care,  and  from  the  V>e*t  in- 
formation we  can  obtain.  We  believe  they  will  be  found  essentially  correct  — 

No.  20'«  Water  twist. 

Price  of  cotton    Cost  of  workman- 

perlb.  ihipand  wute.  Tot»l  cott.         Selling  price.  Profit  Lam. 

d.  d.  d.  d.  d.  i. 

1845  .    4-25   .    3    .    7-25   .    9      .    1-75   .    — 

1846  .    6     .    3-25  .    9-25   .    8'25        —    .    1 

1847  .    4-7    .    3-1   .    7-8   .    7-8     .    —       — 

1848  3'6        3        0-6    .    6-25    .    —    .    0-35 

1849  6-25       3-20  .    9-45   .    8-45    .    —    .    1 


178  THE   HARMONY  OF   INTERESTS. 

No.  40's  Mule  twist. 

Cott  of  workman- 
Price  of  cotton.      ihipandwraMe.  Total  co.1.  Selling  price.  Profit  leu. 
d.                            d.                        d.                          d.                                A  A. 

1845  .4-5.4.         8-5        .10  1-5         .          — 

1846  .6  4-2       .      10-2         .         9-25          .          —         .         0-95 

1847  .5  4-1  9-1        .         8-25          .          —         .         0-85 

1848  .4  .4.8.7  ._.! 

1849  .         6-5          .         4-2       .       10-7        .         9-25          .          —         .         1-45 
The  prices  here  given  are  those  of  November  in  each  year,  both  in  this  and  the  subs* 

quent  tables. 

Stovt  Domestics. 

Price  of  cotton         Workmanrtiip 

per  Ib.                   and  watte.               Total  coil.  Selling  price.                   Profit                        La*. 

d.                           d.                      d.  d.                            d.                         d. 

1845  .    3-75       4    .    7-75   .  9-25       15  .    — 

1846  .    5-6        4-2  .    9-8    .  9-36  .    —  .    0-5 

1847  .    4-25  .    4    .    8-25   .  9-25  .1         — 

1848  .    3-25  .    3-35  .7-1.8  .    0-9  .    — 

1849  .5-7  .4.9-8.  8-75       —  .    1-05 

Medium  Domestics. 

Price  of  cotton  Workmanship 

perlb.  aadwaite.          Total  cort.  Selling  price.  Profit.  Ixm 

d.  d.  d.  d.  d.  d. 

1845  .    4-25    .    5-50  .    9-75   .   11-75    .2        — 

1846  .    6     .    5-75  .   11-75   .   11-25    .    —    .    0-5 

1847  .    4-75    .    5-25  .   10     .    9-75    .    —    .    0-25 

1848  .    3-65    .    5    .    8-65   .    9-25       0-6    .    — 

1849  .        6-45        .        5-5     .       11-75       .10  —  1-75 
In  estimating  the  second  column  in  all  these  tables,  we  have  taken  into  account  both 

the  economy,  in  the  cost  of  workmanship,  where  there  has  been  any,  and  also  the  varia- 
tion in  the  waste  owing  to  the  varying  price  of  cotton,  which  will  account  for  the  slight 
fluctuations  observable. 

Printing  Cloths. 

Price  of  Workmanship 

cotton.  and  waits.         Total  cort.  Selling  price.  Profit  Lam 

d.  d.  d.  d.  d.  d. 

1845  .        5  .  6-85  .  11-85  .  13  .         M5  .         — 

1846  .6-5  7  13-5  .  13-25  .        —  .        0-25 

1847  .        5-5  .  6-75  .  12-25  .  12-25  —  .         — 

1848  .        4-5  .  6-5  .  11  .  10-75  —  .0-25 

1849  .        6-25  .  6-75  .  13-5  .  14-25  .        0-75  .         — 

It  is  important  to  observe  that  the  experience  of  isolated  individuals  will  not  invalidate 
the  conclusions  of  these  tables,  which  show  the  margin  between  the  raw  material  and 
the  manufactured  article  at  the  prices  of  the  day.  These  prices  vary  much  during  the  year  ; 
and  a  manufacturer  who  has  laid  in  his  cotton  at  the  cheapest  time,  and  made  his  con- 
tracts of  sale  at  the  dearest,  may  realize  a  profit,  though  the  general  trade  incurs  a  loss. 
The  only  case  in  which  these  tables  may  lead  to  an  incorrect  conclusion  is,  where  the 
relative  prices  in  November  are  not  fair  representatives  of  the  average  prices  of  the  year. 
In  the  year  1847  this  was  the  case,  the  margin  between  cotton  and  yarn,  or  cotton  and 
cloth,  being  much  greater  in  November  than  during  the  chief  part  of  the  year,  and  the  lot* 
consequently  far  less.  The  average  of  that  year  left  a  large  loss  on  all  articles. 

From  these  tables  it  would  appear — as  indeed  has  been  well  known  to  all  connected 
with  the  trade— that  our  cotton-spinners  and  manufacturers  on  an  average,  and  with  a 
few  exceptions,  have  been  carrying  on  their  works  to  a  loss,  ever  since  1845.  This  nas 
occurred  during  a  period  in  which  the  price  of  the  raw  material  has  fluctuated  upwarns 
and  downwards  at  least  40  per  cent.  Now  can  it  be  supposed  that  they  would  have  en- 
countered the  impossibility,  which  it  is  evident  they  have  encountered,  of  obtaining 
remunerating  prices,  if  they  had  not  produced  more  than  our  actual  markets  can,  on  an 
average  of  years,  take  off? 

At  the  beginning  of  this  year,  great  expectations  were  entertained  of  our  home  demauo. 
It  was  argued,  and  with  good  reason,  that  we  never  yet  had  a  year  of  general  emuiof- 
ment  and  low  prices  of  provisions  combined,  which  was  not  also  a  year  of  very  iarga 
domestic  consumption  of  manufactured  fabrics.  This  year  labour  has  been  in  very  brisk 
request,  and  food  has  never  been  so  cheap  and  plentiful  since  1830.  Yet  our  expectation* 


THE   HARMONY  OF   INTERESTS.  179 

from  these  facts  have  not  been  fully  answered.  The  sellers  of  printing  cloths  and  me- 
dium shirtings  report  that  their  home  demand  has,  on  the  whole,  been  good  ;  the  sellers 
of  domestics  report,  on  the  contrary,  a  decidedly  dull  business,  worse  than  that  of  last 
year ;  but  we  believe  all  agree  that  the  anticipations  with  which  they  began  the  year 
have  by  no  means  been  realized.  We  suspect  the  cause  to  be  this : — The  depreciation 
in  railway  property,  the  effects  of  the  Irish  famine,  and  the  commercial  crash  in  1847, 
have  impoverished  all  classes  of  the  community  to  a  much  greater  extent  than  has  been 
allowed  for  in  the  calculations  of  our  tradesmen.  We  question  whether  "the  power  of 
purchase,"  on  the  part  of  the  British  community,  is  nearly  equal  to  what  it  was  in  1845. 
One  fact  alone  may  enable  us  to  guess  at  the  degree  to  which  its  aggregate  means  of  ex- 
penditure must  have  been  reduced.  In  round  numbers,  the  sum  actually  expended  in  rail- 
ways is  210  millions:  their  actual  value  at  the  prices  of  the  day  does  not  exceed  100 
millions ;  and  many  of  them  pay  little  or  no  dividend. 

Let  us  now  sum  up  the  conclusions  which  our  tables  have  solved  :— 

1.  Our  supply  of  cotton  has  materially  fallen  off  during  the  last  few  years,  and  will  not 
increase  except  under  the  stimulus  of  much  higher  prices  than  have  (till  the  last  few 
months)  obtained. 

2.  That  under  such  ranges  of  prices  our  consumption  will  not  maintain  its  present  ap- 
parent rate,  (or  say  32,000  bales  a  week,)  whatever  be  the  increase  or  improvement  of 
machinery. 

3.  That,  except  under  the  stimulus  of  low  prices,  our  existing  markets  cannot  take  ofl 
as  much  as  our  machinery  can  produce. 

4.  That  the  practical  deductions  pointed  to  by  these  facts  are  two — -first,  a  permanent 
tendency  towards  the  production  of  finer  fabrics ;  and  secondly,  a  check  to  the  increase 
of  mills  and  machinery — of  our  producing  power — that  is,  till  the  increased  supply  of  the 
raw  material  on  the  one  hand,  and  an  increased  consumption  of  the  manufactured  pro- 
duct on  the  other,  shall  once  more  have  restored  the  balance." 

It  is  here  stated  that  the  consumption  of  the  last  five  years  is  greater  by 
3600  bales  per  week  than  in  the  previous  five,  but  it  is  not  shown  whence 
this  cotton  came.  The  whole  quantity  retained  for  consumption  in  the 
second  period  is  less  by  269,000  bales  than  in  the  first,  and  yet  the  consump- 
tion is  said  to  have  been  greater  by  187,000  per  annum,  or  a  total  quantity 
of  935,000  bales,  which  added  to  the  deficiency  in  the  quantity  retained, 
would  make  1,200,000  bales.  The  stock  of  American  on  hand  at  the  close 
of  1849  was  less  by  400,000  bales,  and  that  of  other  descriptions  may  have 
been  reduced  250,000 ;  but  even  this  leaves  550,000  to  be  accounted,  for. 
It  is  scarcely  possible  to  examine  the  figures  given  in  this  paper  without 
arriving  at  the  conclusion  that  the  consumption  is  exaggerated. 

Admitting,  however,  all  that  is  claimed,  I  will  now  proceed  to  show  how  large 
a  portion  of  this  increase  has  resulted  from  the  existence  of  protection  elsewhere. 
It  has  been  shown*  that  our  import  of  cotton  goods  in  two  years,  ending  June 
30,  1843,  the  period  of  almost  free  trade,  was  very  small,  the  average  having 
been  but  $7,184,000.  If,  now,  to  this  we  add  the  increased  import  of  the 
year  ending  June,  1844,  we  obtain  an  average  of  about  .  $9,000,000 
From  June,  1844,  to  June,  1849,  the  average  was  about  .  16,000,000 
During  one-half  of  this  period  the  tariff  of  1842  was  in  existence,  and  during 
more  than  half  of  the  balance,  that  of  1846  was  almost  altogether  inopera- 
tive— and  for  the  balance  of  the  time  the  duty  has  been  thirty  per  cent. 
Nevertheless,  the  amount  imported'^  has  been  almost  double,  and  the  excess 
is  not  less  than  three-fourths  of  a  pound  per  head,  making  an  average  of 
about  35,000  bales  per  annum. 

*  £age  394,  ante. 

•j-By  reference  to  the  tables  in  Chapters  II.  and  III.  it  will  be  seen  that  much  of  these 
imports  in  the  last  two  years  was  obtained  in  exchange  for  certificates  of  debt,  and  there- 
fore deducted  from  the  amount  of  import  as  there  given,  the  object  in  constructing  those 
tables  having  been  that  of  showing  what  was  the  power  of  consumption  resulting  from  the 
power  of  production,  not  that  which  resulted  from  the  impoverishing  system  of  buying  goods 
on  credit 


180  THE   HARMONY  OF   INTERESTS. 

The  average  import  of  yarn  into  the  other  protected  country,  the  Zoll-verein, 
from  1837  to  1841,  was  351,000  quintals.  That  of  1843  was  475,000,  and 
the  average  from  1840  to  1844  was  probably  about  440,000.  In  1845  it 
was  574,000.  Taking  that  as  the  average  from  1845  to  1849,  as  it  appears 
to  have  been,*  we  have  an  excess  of  134,000  cwts.  of  yarn,  equal  to  4*0,000 
bales  of  raw  cotton. 

The  two  together  make  75,000,  which,  being  deducted  from  the  excess  con- 
sumption alleged  to  have  taken  place,  leave  112,000,  and  the  account  will 
now  stand  thus  .  .  .  1840—44  annual  average  1,290,000 

1845^9     ,        "          "  1,402,000 

showing  an  increase  of  little  more  than  eight  per  cent.,  while  the  low  prices 
of  the  second  period  have  been  lower  than  those  of  the  first  by  twenty- 
Jive  per  cent.  It  is  obvious  that  the  increase,  trivial  as  it  has  been, 
among  the  unprotected  consumers,  has  been  obtained  at  the  cost  of  the 
planter,  and  that  the  amount  collected  from  the  population  of  England 
and  that  of  the  world  at  large  for  his  use,  was  greatly  less  in  the  second 
period  than  in  the  first.  The  consumption  of  American  cotton  in  Great  Britain, 
in  the  present  year,  is  estimated  at  only  about  1,100,000  bales,  being 
little  more  than  it  was  ten  years  since,  when  the  average  price  was  as 
high  as  at  present.  It  is  clear  from  this  the  market  of  England  cannot  be 
made  to  grow  in  such  manner  as  to  keep  pace  with  our  production.  Why  it 
cannot,  and  will  not,  may,  I  think,  readily  be  shown  by  an  examination  of 
the  operations  of  the  past  year,  in  which  there  has  existed  no  railroad  specu- 
lation, no  famine,  no  potato-rot,  and  in  which,  on  the  contrary,  every  thing 
has  tended  to  produce  a  perfect  realization  of  the  anticipations  of  the  most 
sanguine  friend  of  the  existing  system. 

The  total  value  of  exports  of  the  kingdom  for  the  ten  months 
ending  November  5,  1849,  was  .  .,  ;  .  .  .  ,£49,400,000 

The  total  of  grain,  and  flour  and  meal  as  grain,  imported  in 
the  same  period,  was  10,300,000  quarters,  which,  at  an  average 
of  36s.  per  quarter,  would  amount  to  about  £18,500,000,  and 
with  43,000  tons  of  potatoes,  to  about          .         .         .         .       18,600,000 
The  number  of  oxen,  bulls,  cows,  sheep,  &c.,  144,000,  say  150,000 

Of  bacon,  beef,  pork,  hams,  butter,  cheese,  and  lard, 
1,500,000  cwts.,  which  at  305.  would  be  .  .  •  .  2,250,000 

Grand  total  of  commodities  now  imported,  but  with 
which  the  people  of  the  United  Kingdom  supplied 
themselves  almost  entirely  only  a  few  years  since  .  £21,000,000 

Deducting  these,  the  amount  of  exports  remains        .         .       28,400,000 

The  exports  of  cotton  manufactures  and  yarn  (£5,833,000) 
amounted  to  £22,550,000,  and  if  we  estimate  the  cotton  re- 
quired for  their  production  at  three-eighths  of  this  amount,  we 
obtain  as  its  value  . 8,500,000 

The  wool  imported  to  be  manufactured  and  exported  amount- 

*  The  export  of  yarn  to  the  ports  through  which  Germany  is  supplied,  in  four  of  those 
years  was  as  follows : — 

1845.  1846.  1847.  1848. 

Belgium,  Ibs.  .  .  3,917,000  5,359,000  3,520,000  3,168,000 
Holland  «  .  .  21,556,000  24,662,000  16,206,000  18,877,000 
Hanse  Towns,  &c.  .  40,315,000  45,041,000  36,123,000  32,910,000 

Total  Ibs.      .       64,788,000       75,062.000       55,849,000      54,955,000 


THE   HARMONY  OF   INTERESTS.  18] 

<sd  to  nearly  60,000,000  of  pounds,  which,  at  a  shilling  a  pound, 

would  be 3,000,000 

The  flax  imported  was  1,553,000  cwts.,  and  the  average 
price  being  32s.,  the  amount  is 2,500,000 

If  we  now  add  for  the  hides,  timber,  copper  ores,  Swedish 
iron,  block-tin,  brimstone,  indigo  and  other  dye-stuffs,  silk, 
sugar,  gold,  silver,  quicksilver,  and  other  foreign  materials 
included  in  this  vast  amount  of  manufactures  exported  only  .  2,500,000 

We  obtain  as  the  total  of  foreign  raw  materials  exported  .  £16,500,000 
leaving  as  the  value  of  the  products  of  the  labour  and  land 

of  England  exported  in  ten  months £11,900,000 

or  per  annum     .  .  ....    £14,280,000 

being  at  the  rate  of  9/6  =  $2 -2  8  per  head,  to  be  applied  to  the  purchase  of 
cotton,  sugar,  coffee,  tea,  silks,  dying  materials,  timber,  and  all  other  articles 
of  necessity  or  of  luxury  required  for  domestic  consumption,  grain,  potatoes, 
live  animals,  and  cured  provisions  alone  excepted. 

If  the  reader  will  now  compare  this  statement  with  those  of  other  years 
before  given,*  he  will,  I  think,  have  no  difficulty  in  satisfying  himself  that 
"  the  power  of  purchase"  of  the  people  of  Great  Britain  is  in  a  state  of  rapid 
diminution,  and  that  to  that  fact  is  due  the  distress  existing  among  her 
people. 

It  will  be  said,  however,  that  she  does  consume  much  more  than  this 
amount.  She  does,  and  how  she  is  enabled  to  do  it,  I  propose  now  to  show. 
Thus  far,  however,  the  accounts  of  the  various  periods  are  made  out  precisely 
alike,  and  answer  for  the  purpose  of  comparing  the  present  with  the  past. 

It  will  be  seen  that  the  prices  of  all  the  articles  I  have  particularized 
would  be  low  even  here.  Of  the  grain,  nearly  three-fourths  are  wheat  or  wheat 
flour,  and  the  price  is  but  4s.  or  88  cents  per  bushel,  delivered  in  England. 
The  bacon,  beef,  pork,  lard,  and  butter  are  at  6J  cents  per  pound,  also 
delivered  in  England.  The  flax  is  at  seven  cents  per  pound.  The  wool  is  at 
a  shilling,  and  the  cotton  supposed  to  be  about  5jc?.  per  pound.  These  are 
prices  at  which  we  should  not  desire  to  deliver  the  same  commodities  at  New 
York  or  Philadelphia,  on  their  way  to  Liverpool.  Nevertheless,  Great  Britain 
•obtains  all  these,  and  immense  quantities  of  other  commodities  in  addi- 
tion, and  yet  brings  its  largely  in  debt  on  the  year's  business.  She  uses 
sugar  valued  at  £5,000,000.  Large  quantities  of  cotton,  silk,  hemp,  and 
hides,  are  consumed  at  home.  Her  consumption  of  tea  is  40  millions  of 
pounds.  Of  timber  she  consumes  a  million  of  loads,  and  the  price  of  Canada 
red  pine  is  £3  per  load.  How  does  she  acquire  the  power  to  do  all  these 
things  ? 

The  cotton  that  comes  from  Bombay,  as  stated  above,  frequently  yields  to 
the  shipper  at  that  place  but  a  penny  per  pound,  which  will  not  defray  the 
cost  of  transportation  from  the  place  of  production  to  the  place  of  shipment, 
leaving  nothing  whatever  for  the  cost  of  production,  and  yet  the  poor  pro- 
ducer pays  to  the  Company  heavy  taxes  for  the  use  of  that  land,  which  taxes 
are  remitted  to  England  for  the  payment  of  expenses,  pensions,  dividends,  &c. 

The  sugar  from  the  Mauritius  sells  for  22s.  per  cwt.,  or  2%d.  per  pound, 
a  price  that  cannot  yield  the  shipper  much,  if  any  thing,  more  than  a  penny 
per  pound.  The  producer  receives  almost  nothing.  It  was  shown  by  the 
accounts  of  several  large  houses,  owners  of  real  estate  in  that  island,  that  for 
years  the  estates  received  nothing  whatever.  So  is  it  with  Canada,  and  her 
lumber. 

•  See  page  57. 


182  THE   HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS. 

The  charges  upon  all  commodities  that  pass  into  England  are  immense, 
and  they  cannot  be  otherwise.  The  producers  are  few,  and  the  consumers 
are  many,  and  the  latter  must  be  supported  by  the  former.  Wherever  four 
families  must  eat  and  but  one  raises  food,  the  share  that  falls  to  the  former 
must  be  small,  and  therefore  it  is  that  the  farmers  and  planters  of  the  world 
are  kept  so  poor. 

With  every  step  downward  the  operation  of  the  system  tends  to  become 
more  severe.  A  penny  taken  out  of  a  pound  of  cotton  that  sells  for  a  shil- 
ling, is  a  trifle,  but  a  penny  out  of  3d.  falls  heavily.  When  cotton  is  high, 
it  sells  rapidly  and  the  charges  are  few.  When  the  crop  is  large  and  it  sells 
slowly,  the  charges  are  numerous.  So  is  it  with  sugar,  tobacco,  rice,  and  all 
other  of  the  products  of  the  earth.  With  the  diminishing  power  of  consump- 
tion prices  universally  have  diminished,  while  the  necessity  for  advances, 
storage,  &c.,  has  increased,  giving  to  the  exchanger  power  to  take  for  himself 
not  only  a  larger  proportion,  but  a  larger  quantity  than  before.  Hence 
it  is  that  Great  Britain  is  enabled  to  consume  so  much  while  producing 
so  little. 

Diminish  her  power  of  taxing  the  planters  and  farmers  of  the  world,  and 
it  will  speedily  be  seen  that  the  power  of  consumption  that  even  now  exists 
results  from  the  ability  to  throw  upon  others  the  burden  that  she  should  bear 
alone.  The  Economist,  a  journal  not  to  be  suspected  of  exaggerating  the 
evils  of  the  present  state  of  things,  expresses  its  belief  that  "  the  power  of 
purchase"  on  the  part  of  the  British  community  is  not  nearly  equal  to  what 
it  was  in  1845.*  That  such  is  the  case  there  can  be  no  doubt,  and  that  the 

*  This  same  journal  but  a  fortnight  before  assured  its  readers  that  "  ever  since  there  had 
been  a  reduction  of  the  duties  of  the  sliding  scale,  and  a  probability  that  the  corn  laws 
would  be  abolished,  the  farmers  have  steadily  improved  their  cultivation  and  produced 
more."  If  production  has  increased,  how  is  it  that  the  power  of  purchase  has'  decreased  ? 
If  the  power  of  purchase  has  decreased,  how  are  the  people  enabled  to  purchase  all 
this  tupposed  increased  domestic  product,  and  the  enormous  quantity  that  is  imported  ? 
The  power  of  consumption  and  that  of  production  go  hand  in  hand  with  each  other,  and 
if  « the  power  of  purchase"  has  diminished,  as  it  unquestionably  has,  it  is  because  the 
power  of  producing  things  with  which  to  purchase  has  declined. 

Much  of  the  diminution  in  the  "  power  of  purchase"  is  ascribed  to  the  railroad  specu- 
lation, but  it  is  difficult  to  see  how  that  should  have  produced  any  such  effect.  Under  it 
much  property  changed  hands,  but  the  actual  expenditure  was  merely  the  cost  of  grading 
and  laying  the  roads,  and  it  cannot  be  doubted  that  the  labour  that  has  been  saved  by 
means  of  the  use  of  the  roads  has  been  quite  equal  to  the  amount  expended.  The  price 
paid  for  land,  and  the  fees  to  parliamentary  agents,  &c.,  were  merely  transfers  from  the 
pocket  of  one  man  to  that  of  another,  and  could  not  have  impaired  the  "  power  of  pur- 
chase." The  railroad  speculation  produced  the  roads,  and  existing  as  they  do,  they  tend 
to  increase  the  power  of  production  and  consumption.  It  is  necessary,  therefore,  to  look 
elsewhere  for  the  causes  of  the  state  of  things  now  existing  in  England.  They  are  to  be 
found  in  the  necessity  for  competing  with  the  lowest  priced  and  most  worthless  labour  of 
the  world.  The  results  of  that  necessity  are  exhibited  in  the  following  facts,  which  will 
not  only  account  for  the  present  diminution  in  "  the  power  of  purchase,"  but  relieve  us 
from  difficulty  in  accounting  for  future  diminutions. 

«  It  appears  from  a  parliamentary  return,  that  the  holders  of  farms,  who  in  1845  were 
310,000  over  the  Emerald  Isle,  have  in  1848  sunk  to  108.000.  Two  hundred  and  two 
thousand  cultivators  of  land  have  disappeared  in  three  years,  and  with  them  at  least  half 
of  the  capital  by  means  of  which  the  land  was  made  to  produce  any  thing."— B/ac&teooeT* 
Magazine,  December,  1849.  The  bank-note  circulation  of  Ireland,  which  in  August,  1846, 
was  £7,500,000,  had  fallen  in  August,  1849,  to  £3,833,000. — Ibid.  The  poor  rate  of 
Ireland,  which  in  1846  was  £200,000,  has  risen  to  £1,900,000.  That  of  Scotland  has 
risen  in  three  years  from  £185,000  to  £560,000.  In  Glasgow,  anterior  to  1846,  it  was 
£30,000.  In  1848-9,  it  was  £200,000.  The  number  of  paupers  in  1845-6,  was  7,454 
In  1847-8,  51,852.  The  railroad  tolls  of  1845  averaged  £2,640  per  mile  In  1849, 
£1,780.— Ibid. 


THE   HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS.  183 

power  of  purchase  must  continue  to  diminish  with  further  diminution  in  the 
power  of  production,  is  quite  certain. 

We  see  that,  notwithstanding  low  prices  for  grain,  the  imports  are  im- 
mense, averaging  more  than  nine  millions  of  our  oushels  per  month.  Will 
this  continue  ?  In  answer,  the  domestic  crop  of  this  year  has  not  failed,  nor 
have  there  been  any  reasons  why  the  export  from  the  grain-producing  coun- 
tries of  the  world  should  be  larger  than  usual.  We  are  assured  that  Russia 
can  supply  fifty  millions  of  quarters  annually,  and  that  much  of  it  is  now 
wasted  for  want  of  a  market.  She  has  now  a  market,  and  so  long  as  a  bushel 
of  wheat  will  yield  to  the  producer  the  price  of  a  yard  of  cotton  cloth,  he  will 
accept  even  that  rather  than  waste  it.  We  are  assured  that  he  cannot  afford  to 
raise  it  at  any  such  price,  but  what  else  can  he  do  ?  Deprived  of  other  em- 
ployment for  his  time,  he  must  raise  food  for  himself,  and  with  the  sur- 
plus purchase  clothing,  even  if  he  have  to  starve  himself  to  obtain  the  little 
that  he  wears.  The  error  of  English  writers  consists  in  assuming  that  there 
is  such  a  thing  as  a  necessary  price.  The  poor  labourer  in  India,  we  are 
assured  by  this  same  writer,  obtains  for  his  cotton  no  more  than  the  mere  rent 
of  his  land,  leaving  nothing  for  his  labour,  yet  he  still  cultivates  cotton  to 
exchange  for  the  yard  of  cloth  with  which  he  covers  his  loins. 

The  people  of  England  first  inflicted  upon  themselves  a  necessity  for  com- 
peting with  the  "cheap"  labour  of  India  in  the  manufacture  of  cottons. 
That  produced  a  necessity  for  competition  with  the  "  cheap"  labour  of  Russia 
in  the  production  of  food,  the  consequences  of  which  are  thus  described  in 
the  recent  quarterly  report  of  the  Registrar-general : — "  The  population  of 
England  has  suffered,  died,  and  decreased,  during  the  quarter,  to  a  degree  of 
which  there  is  no  example  in  the  present  century."  Emigration  has  gone  on 
so  rapidly,  and  so  much  in  advance  of  immigration,  that  "  England  has  now 
less  inhabitants  by  several  thousand  than  were  within  her  shores  at  mid- 
summer." 

The  system  tends  to  increase  man's  necessities  and  to  diminish  his  power.  It 
is  here  shown  how  enormous  was  the  difference  in  the  prices  of  cotton  in  the  two 
periods,  and  we  may  now  look  to  see  whether  the  price  of  cloth  and  iron  changed 
therewith.  From  1840  to  1844,  the  average  price  of  a  piece  of  gray  cotton 
cloth  was  6s.  Id. ;  from  1845  to  1849,  it  was  above  6s.  Here  is  a  reduction  of 
ten  per  cent,  to  set  off  against  changes  of  40  per  cent.  The  average  price  of 
iron  in  1845,  1846,  and  1847,  was  50  per  cent,  higher  than  that  of  the 
four  previous  years ;  and  thus,  while  the  cotton  was  lower  than  before,  the 
thing  which,  of  all  others,  the  producer  of  cotton  desires  to  use,  was  vastly 
higher.  He  was  steadily  giving  more  and  receiving  less,  and  it  is  no  matter 
of  surprise  that  his  power  of  production  diminished  and  his  condition  steadily 
deteriorated. 

To  this  it  is  due  that  the  power  to  pay  for  cotton  cloth  on  the  part  of  the 
people  subjected  to  the  system  is  steadily  diminishing,  and  that  "  the  con- 
sumption cannot  be  maintained."  Nothing,  "  we  are  assured,  but  the  stimu- 
lus of  low  prices"  will  enable  "  the  existing  markets"  to  take  off  the  pro- 
duce of  the  machinery  of  England ;  and,  to  secure  a  supply  at  low  prices, 
every  English  writer  on  the  subject  is  looking  for  what  is  called  "  cheap  la- 
bour." That  of  the  Zooloos  may  be  had  at  10s.  per  month,  and  Natal  is 
advantageously  situated  for  maintaining  "  competition  with  the  States." 

The  "  practical  deduction  pointed  to  by  these  facts,"  and  that  which  most 
interests  the  planter,  is  that  there  must  be  "  a  check  to  the  increase  of  mills 
and  machinery,"  until  "  the  increased  supply  of  the  raw  material"  shall 
bring  down  the  price  of  cotton  to  the  level  of  the  powers  of  the  consumers, 
or  until  "  the  power  of  purchase"  shall  rise  to  a  level  with  the  existing  prices. 
That  the  latter,  among  the  unprotected  communities  of  the  world,  has 


184  THE   HARMONY  OF   INTERESTS. 

steadily  declined,  during  a  long  series  of  years,  is  obvious,  and  there 
no  reason  for  supposing  that  the  future  will  be  different  from  the  past.  The 
only  remaining  mode  of  "  restoring  the  balance"  is  that  of  reducing  cotton 
to  the  level  of  a  constantly  diminishing  "power  of  purchase." 

That  it  will  be  so  diminished,  unless  the  planters  can  determine  to  help 
themselves,  there  can  be  no  doubt.  The  men  who  have  heretofore  raised 
sugar  and  coffee  are  now  about  to  turn  their  attention  to  cotton,  as  likely 
to  be  more  profitable  than  either.  The  people  of  Jamaica  have  been  forced 
to  abandon  coffee,  and  sugar  cannot,  as  their  journals  inform  us,  be  any  longer 
profitably  cultivated.  Why  it  cannot,  the  Economist  informs  us. 

The  same  number,  from  which  the  above  long  extract  is  made,  informs  us 
that  the  sugar  market  is  "  drooping,"  the  "  expectation  of  a  large  additional 
consumption  not  having  been  realized."  The  consequence  is  seen  in  the  fact, 
that  the  sugar  of  the  distant  Isle  of  France  is  quoted  at  22s.  5d  per  cwt., 
being  two  and  two-fifth  pence  per  pound,  yielding  to  the  shipper,  after  pay- 
ing freight  and  charges,  about  as  much  as  the  cotton  above  stated  to  have 
been  shipped  from  Bombay,  to  wit,  one  penny,  and  to  the  producer,  on  his 
plantation,  but  little  more  than .  is  necessary  to  pay  his  rent.  Under  such 
circumstances,  the  labour  of  the  people  of  the  Mauritius  becomes  "  cheaper," 
and  may  ultimately  become  as  "  cheap"  as  that  of  the  Zooloos. 

Thus  is  it  everywhere.  The  late  cotton  planter  of  Alabama  is  trying 
sugar,  and  the  sugar  planter  of  Jamaica  is  determined  to  try  cotton,  under 
an  impression  that  "  a  sufficient  supply  is  not  yet  raised  to  meet  the  demand 
which  exists  for  the  article."  The  real  cause  of  difficulty  is,  that  the  cotton 
planter  and  his  neighbours  are  unable  to  obtain  one-third  as  much  sugar  as 
they  would  desire  to  consume,  and  the  sugar  planter  is  unable  to  obtain  one- 
third  as  much  cloth  as  he  would  desire  to  consume,  because  the  cost  of  both  in 
labour  is  so  greatly  enhanced  by  the  necessity  for  making  their  exchanges  in 
the  distant  market  of  England.  Were  both  determined  to  make  a  market 
on  the  land  for  the  products  of  the  land,  each  would  obtain  in  return  for  the 
same  quantity  of  labour  thrice  as  much  as  now ;  whereas,  if  they  continue 
to  maintain  the  monopoly  system  of  England,  they  must  obtain  even  less 
than  now,  little  as  it  is.  Among  the  planters  of  the  world,  there  is  perfect 
harmony  of  interests,  and  those  of  all  are  to  be  promoted  by  the  adoption  of 
a  system  that  shall  tend  to  raise  the  value  of  labour,  thereby  enabling  the 
man  of  Ireland,  who  now  consumes  one  pound  of  cotton,  to  become  the  man 
of  America,  consuming  a  dozen  or  twenty  pounds. 

The  object  of  every  effort  at  maintaining  in  existence  this  great  monopoly 
of  machinery  is  that  of  preventing  increase  in  the  value  of  labour  and  land 
throughout  the  world,  that  commodities  may  be  had  "cheap."  How  great  is 
the  power  exercised  for  this  purpose,  will  readily  be  seen  by  all  who  study 
the  sliding-scale  system,  by  which  consumption  is  diminished  with  any  small 
advance  of  price,  and  the  tendency  upwards  thus  counteracted.  The  existing 
consumption  can  be  maintained  only  at  the  present  minimum  prices,  and  the 
reason  why  it  can  only  be  so  maintained  is,  that  "cheap"  cotton  and  "cheap" 
sugar  make  the  labour-cost  of  cloth  and  iron  so  great  that  the  poor  culti- 
vator of  those  "  cheap"  things  cannot  afford  to  purchase  either.  Dear  as  is  the 
cloth  to  the  consumers,  and  little  as  the  cotton  has  yielded  to  its  producers,  the 
manufacturers  have,  we  are  assured,  been  working  at  a  loss  during  nearly 
all  those  five  years,  and  the  profits  are  set  down  at  only  IJc?.  per  pound 
in  1845,  designated  by  Messrs.  Rathbone,  in  their  circular  accompanying  the 
diagram  given  at  page  75,  as  one  of  "  enormous  profits  to  manufacturers." 
The  differences  in  the  prices  of  both  cotton  and  yarn  as  here  given,  from 
those  given  by  Messrs.  R.,  are  sometimes  remarkable.  The  cost  of  converting 
a  pound  of  cotton  into  yarn  No.  40,  is  also  remarkable,  and  must  embrace 


THE   HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS.  185 

many  allowances  for  wear  and  tear,  management,  &c.  A  mill  in  this  neigh- 
bourhood, at  work  upon  No.  35,  converts  into  cloth  above  a  million  of  pounds, 
with  the  labour  of  800  persons.  The  average  wages  of  England  are  under 
30?.  per  head,  and  this  would  give  9000?.,  or  about  two  millions  of  pence, 
for  wages  of  labour  required  for  converting  a  million  of  pounds  into  cloth,  or 
two  pence  per  pound.  Notwithstanding  this  unceasing  succession  of  losses, 
there  has  been,  as  we  are  assured,  a  constant  increase  of  machinery  for  doing 
the  work,  while  the  whole  increase  of  consumption  is  trifling.  It  is  difficult 
to  reconcile  these  statements. 

Less  difficult  is  it  to  ascertain  what  is  the  policy  of  the  planter.  It  is  to 
break  down  the  monopoly  and  briny  the  machinery  of  England  to  the  cotton 
fields,  and  there  it  will  come  whenever  the  producers  of  food  and  cotton  shall 
declare  to  the  world  that  it  is  their  fixed  policy  to  extend  the  consumption  of 
cotton  by  enabling  themselves  to  supply  it  cheaply  to  the  consumers,  a  work  that 
is  to  be  accomplished  by  freeing  themselves  from  the  control  of  those  who 
now  live,  and  move,  and  have  their  being,  by  means  of  standing  between 
the  producer  and  the  consumer,  impoverishing  the  one  so  that  he  cannot  con- 
tinue to  produce,  and  the  other  so  that  he  cannot  continue  to  consume. 

It  cannot  fail  to  strike  the  reader  as  singular,  that  the  clever  writer  of  this 
article  supposes  that  the  system  which  destroys  cultivation  in  India  and  Bra- 
zil has  no  such  effect  in  this  country.  He  assumes  that  we  produce  all  we 
can,  whereas  we  know  that  the  great  object  throughout  the  South  is  to  limit 
production,  and  that  the  producers  are  perpetually  flying  from  lands  that  have 
been  exhausted  to  seek  new  ones  to  be  again  exhausted,  and  wasting  on  the 
road  more  labour  than  would  add  to  the  crop  hundreds  of  thousands  of  bales. 

Had  the  planters  eight  years  since  determined  that  the  loom  slwuld  come 
to  the  cotton,  the  crop  of  this  year  would  exceed  three  millions,  and  the  price 
would  be  higher  than  it  is  now  with  one  of  two  millions ;  for  we  should  our- 
selves be  consuming  much  more  than  a  million,  the  purchasers  of  which  would 
be  found  among  prosperous  makers  of  iron,  who  would  be  producing  1200  or 
1500  thousand  tons  to  be  applied  to  the  making  of  roads  for  the  use  of  pros- 
perous farmers  and  equally  prosperous  miners  and  manufacturers.  Increase 
of  price  thus  produced  increases  consumption,  and  such  is  the  tendency  of 
protection.  Increase  of  price  resulting  from  short  crops  tends  to  diminish  con- 
sumption, and  such  is  the  tendency  of  the  monopoly  system.  It  destroys  both 
the  power  to  produce  and  the  power  to  consume. 

CHAPTER  SEVENTEENTH. 
HOW   PROTECTION   AFFECTS    THE   CURRENCY. 

IF  protection  be  "  a  war  upon  labour  and  capital,"  it  must  tend  to  produce 
those  disturbances  of  the  currency  that  tend  so  greatly  to  diminish  the  return 
to  both.  If,  on  the  contrary,  it  be  a  peaceful  measure  of  resistance  to  a  sys- 
tem tending  to  the  oppression  of  the  labourers  and  capitalists  of  the  world, 
then  it  must  tend  to  produce  that  steadiness  of  the  currency  so  desirable  to 
all,  labourer  and  mechanic,  farmer  and  planter,  ship-owner  and  merchant. 

The  real  currency  of  the  world  consists  of  labour  and  the  things  for  which 
men  are  willing  to  give  labour,  food,  clothing,  fuel,  iron,  &c.  That  which  is 
usually  denominated  "  currency,"  is  merely  the  standard  by  which  their  re- 
spective values  are  measured.  The  labourer  sells  the  exertions  of  a  week  for 
five  dollars,  and  he  receives  in  return  five  bushels  of  wheat,  also  valued  at 
five  dollars.  The  capitalist  sells  a  house  for  twenty  thousand  dollars,  and 
orders  the  purchase  of  a  quantity  of  shares  of  stock  which,  measured  by  the 
same  standard,  are  found  to  be  the  equivalent  of  that  number  of  dollars. 

The  price  of  wheat  changes  with  the  size  of  the  crop.     So  does  that  of 


186  THE   HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS. 

sugar.  If  the  supply  of  wheat  be  large,  and  that  of  sugar  small,  much  wheat 
will  be  given  for  little  sugar. 

The  introduction  of  a  third  commodity,  itself  liable  to  variation  in  the 
supply,  as  is  the  case  with  money,  tends  to  produce  additional  variations  in 
the  quantity  of  one  commodity  that  must  be  given  for  another.  Thus,  if  the 
supply  of  money  be  large  among  one  set  of  wheat  raisers,  and  small  among 
another,  the  raiser  of  sugar  will  sell  in  the  first  and  buy  in  the  last,  obtaining 
much  money  from  the  one  and  giving  little  to  the  other. 

Were  all  arrangements  for  the  production,  purchase,  or  sale  of  commodities 
or  property  executed  on  the  instant,  this  cause  of  disturbance  would  scarcely 
exist,  because  the  prices  of  all  would  be  similarly  affected,  being  high  when 
money  was  plenty,  and  low  when  it  was  scarce,  and  the  quantity  of  sugar  to 
be  given  for  wheat,  or  wheat  for  sugar,  would  depend  upon  the  size  of  the 
crops  almost  as  completely  as  if  no  intermediate  commodity  were  used. 
Such,  however,  is  not  the  case.  The  merchant  buys  coffee  in  January,  and 
contracts  to  deliver  its  equivalent  in  money  in  July,  at  which  time  money 
may  be  so  scarce  that  six  pounds  of  coffee  will  command  no  more  than  would 
have  been  done  in  January  by  four  pounds.  The  merchant  commences  to 
build  a  ship  in  July,  when  money  is  scarce  and  the  price  of  labour  is  low, 
and  he  finishes  it  when  money  is  plenty  and  wages  are  high,  and  it  costs  him 
ten,  fifteen,  or  twenty  per  cent,  more  than  he  had  calculated  upon.  The 
little  trader,  on  the  contrary,  who  buys  and  sells  from  day  to  day,  loses 
nothing.  If  he  buys  high  he  sells  high,  and  if  prices  are  low  to  buy,  he 
makes  them  low  to  sell,  and  the  measure  of  his  business  is  the  measure  of  his 
profits. 

The  great  sufferers  by  such  variations  are  those  the  nature  of  whose  pro- 
perty, or  the  character  of  whose  business,  requires  them  to  make  arrange- 
ments far  ahead,  and  to  take  the  risks  incident  to  changes  in  the  currency 
for  the  whole  period  that  elapses  between  the  commencement  and  the  con- 
clusion of  an  undertaking.  Such  are  all  the  persons  the  products  of  whose 
labour  are  not  intended  for  immediate  consumption — the  owners  of  houses, 
farms,  factories,  furnaces,  railroads — all,  in  fact,  connected  with  the  improve- 
ment  of  land.  In  a  time  of  pressure  for  money  in  one  place,  flour,  cotton, 
cloth,  and  other  articles  intended  for  daily  consumption,  may  be  transferred  to 
other  places  where  money  is  plenty,  and  the  changes  in  their  prices  are  there- 
fore small  when  compared  with  those  which  are  experienced  by  the  possessors 
of  property  that  cannot  be  transferred,  and  is  therefore  obliged  to  bear  the 
whole  burden  of  the  change.  In  such  cases  land  becomes  entirely  unsaleable 
except  at  an  enormous  reduction  of  price,  to  which  its  owners  must  submit  if 
they  are  placed  in  a  position  to  render  sales  necessary,  and  thus  it  is  that  so 
many  persons  connected  with  land  and  its  improvement  are  ruined  by  revul- 
sions that  affect  but  in  a  slight  degree  the  operations  of  the  retail  grocer. 

Sueh,  likewise,  is  the  case  with  labour.  The  man  who  has  a  family  and 
finds  no  demand  for  his  labour  cannot  change  his  locality.  He  and  his 
family  must  suffer  together.  Food  may  be  at  a  low  money-price,  but  if  he 
can  obtain  no  employment,  the  labour-price  is  so  high  that  he  cannot  pur- 
chase it.  Land  and  labour,  then,  are  specially  interested  in  the  maintenance 
of  uniformity  in  the  standard  by  which  the  products  of  both  are  measured, 
because  they  are  the  great  sufferers  by  the  changes  which  occur  in  the  pro- 
gress of  time. 

Time  and  distance  are,  in  this  respect,  the  equivalents  of  each  other.  The 
man  who  builds  a  house  calculates  upon  the  continuance,  during  the  period 
of  its  erection,  of  the  state  of  things  that  existed  at  its  commencement,  and 
he  who  remits  to  China  to  purchase  teas,  bases  his  calculations  on  the  state 
of  affairs  that  existed  in  that  country  three  months  previously.  If  money  in 


THE   HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS.  187 

the  mean  time  has  become  more  abundant,  he  may  pay  higher  for  his  teas 
than  he  had  calculated  upon,  and  if  before  their  arrival  it  becomes  less 
abundant  here,  he  will  obtain  less,  and  thus  will  reap  loss  instead  of  profit. 
The  man  who  raises  cotton  when  he  might  have  raised  sugar  or  wheat,  bases 
his  calculations  on  the  state  of  affairs  that  he  supposes  will  exist  in  a  foreign 
country,  and  is  thus  forced  to  superadd  the  risks  of  distance  to  those  of  time. 
If  he  exchanged  his  products  with  his  neighbour,  both  would  be  subject  to 
the  same  variations,  so  far  as  the  currency  was  concerned.  If  money  were 
less  abundant,  flour,  sugar,  pork,  cloth,  and  iron  would  feel  its  effects  pre- 
cisely as  cotton  felt  them,  and  though  he  might  obtain  less  money,  he  would 
have  precisely  the  same  quantity  of  the  commodities  for  the  purchase  of 
which  he  required  to  have  money.  The  proximity  of  the  consumer  and  the 
producer  tends,  then,  to  lessen  the  difficulties  resulting  from  changes  in  the 
currency  by  which  land  and  labour  are  always  the  chief  sufferers. 

The  object  of  the  colonial  system  was  that  of  compelling  the  farmers  and 
planters  of  the  world  to  make  their  exchanges  in  a  distant  market,  and  thus 
to  increase  the  time  within  which  such  risk  must  be  borne,  adding  thereto  a.11  those 
which  result  from  distance.  When  the  Hindoo  exchanged  his  cotton  on  the 
spot  for  cloth,  the  prices  of  cotton,  cloth,  and  labour  were  governed  by  the 
same  circumstances,  for  the  exchanges  were  made  on  the  instant.  To  make 
his  exchanges  now,  two  years'  time  are  required,  and  he  is,  during  all  that 
period,  subject  to  the  risk  of  changes  like  those  which  have  marked  the  years 
1847  and  1848.  His  pursuit  is  rendered  one  of  mere  gambling,  without  the 
advantage  of  holding  his  own  cards,  although  bound  to  pay  the  losses. 

All  tie  losses  he  and  his  fellow-planters  do  pay,  as  will  be  seen  by  those 
who  will  study  out  the  working  of  the  system.  The  cotton,  the  wool,  the 
sugar,  and  the  food  of  the  world  are  sent  to  England  for  exchange.  Her 
people  buy  and  sell  on  the  instant,  the  time  that  is  required  to  elapse  between 
the  purchase  of  the  wool  and  the  sale  of  the  yarn  not  exceeding  a  single  week. 
If  yarn  fall,  so  does  cotton.  If  cotton  rise,  so  does  yarn.  The  whole  loss 
from  changes  of  currency  resulting  from  time  and  distance  is  thus  thrown 
upon  the  planter.  The  whole  gain  resulting  from  the  diminution  of  the  risks 
of  both  goes  to  the  proprietor  of  the  small  and  easily  transported  spindle,  the 
cost  of  which  is  as  nothing  when  compared  with  the  cost  of  the  great  machine 
required  for  producing  the  wool. 

The  nation  that  thus  desires  to  compel  all  the  other  nations  of  the  world 
to  bring  to  her  their  products,  that  they  may  there  be  measured  by 
her  standard,  ought  to  be  able  to  show  that  it  is  one  the  length,  or  the 
contents,  of  which  must,  under  any  and  every  circumstance,  remain  un- 
changed. The  standard  of  weight  and  that  of  length  are  fixed  and  unchange- 
able. So  should  be  that  of  value.  Far,  otherwise,  however,  is  it.  The  con- 
trol of  that  great  and  important  standard  for  the  measurement  of  the  values 
of  the  world  is  placed  in  the  hands  of  the  bank  of  England,  the  directors  of 
which  have  proved  their  utter  incompetency  for  the  important  business  dele- 
gated to  them  by  bringing  the  institution,  at  four  different  periods  within 
the  last  thirty  years,  within  the  jaws  of  bankruptcy.  Their  object  is  to 
make  large  dividends,  and,  to  accomplish  that  object,  money  is,  as  it  is  called, 
made  plenty ;  that  is,  the  directors  overtrade  largely,  and  thus  block  up  the 
capital  of  individuals  who  find  themselves  compelled  to  take  from  the  bank 
evidences  of  debt  (certificates  of  deposit)  not  bearing  interest,  when  they 
would  have  preferred  other  evidences  bearing  interest,  and  would  have  ob- 
tained them  at  reasonable  prices  had  not  the  bank  commenced  to  overtrade. 
With  every  increase  of  this  indebtedness,  called  deposits,  the  bank  considers 
itself  richer  and  overtrades  further,  until  at  length  speculation  is  produced, 
railroads  are  made,  ships  and  houses  are  built,  and  then  the  day  of  settlement 


188  THE   HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS. 

arrives,  when  the  bank  crushes  everybody  in  the  effort  to  save  itself.  The 
standard  of  value  shrinks  to  half,  and  the  owner  of  fixed  property  finds  him- 
self miiied,  while  the  planter  obtains  threepence  where  he  had  looked  for 
sixpence,  and  the  farmer  is  brought  in  debt  for  charges  on  his  food  where  he 
had  locked  to  realize  a  dollar  a  bushel. 

The  man  of  England,  who  buys  cotton  and  sells  yarn  or  cloth,  suffers  lit- 
tle from  those  changes.  On  the  appearance  of  the  first  sign  of  change,  he 
shortens  his  hours  of  work,  or  diminishes  the  number  of  his  hands,  and  then,  when 
the  time  for  it  arrives,  he  closes  his  mill.  His  work-people  are  thus,  in  whole 
or  in  part,  deprived  of  wages,  and  rendered  unable  to  purchase  food  or  cloth- 
ing, the  consequence  of  which  is  diminished  demand  and  reduced  prices  for 
both,  and  thus  are  all  the  losses  thrown  upon  the  farmers  and  planters  of  the 
world,  who  are  ruined  by  the  necessity  for  dependence  on  a  country  which 
desires  to  establish  for  itself  a  monopoly  of  machinery  for  the  supply  of  iron 
and  for  the  conversion  of  wool  into  cloth,  with  all  of  which  they  might  supply 
themselves  at  less  cost  than  is  now  imposed  upon  them  in  each  and  every  year. 


IT  is  usual  to  attribute  the  disasters  of  the  period  from  1836  to  1842  to 
derangements  in  our  currency,  proceeding  from  erroneous  action  at  home ;  but 
those  who  examine  more  carefully  will  find  that  they  were  themselves  effects 
resulting  from  other  causes,  as  I  propose  now  to  show. 

It  is  usual  to  talk  of  capital  as  money  ;  but  money  is  only  the  standard  by 
which  commodities  are  measured,  and  a  very  small  quantity  of  the  dne  suffices 
to  measure  a  large  quantity  of  the  other.  The  same  dollar  may  be  used  a 
thousand  times  in  "a  week,  each  time  acting  as  the  standard  by  which  labour, 
flour,  cotton,  sugar,  &c.,  have  been  measured.  The  man  who  has  sold  a  cargo 
of  sugar  has  acquired  a  credit  with  somebody  by  aid  of  which  he  may  obtain 
a  cargo  of  flour.  The  borrower  from  a  bank  has  acquired  a  credit  which  ho 
transfers  to  his  neighbour,  and  that  neighbour  transfers  it  to  a  third,  who 
divides  it  among  his  workmen,  and  by  its  aid  they  obtain  food,  clothing,  and 
shelter. 

Whenever  the  daily  demand  for  labour  and  its  products  is  equal  to  the  daily 
supply,  the  rate  of  interest,  or  the  price  of  capital  seeking  investment,  will  remain 
stationary,  to  the  great  advantage  of  the  owners  of  landed  and  other  fixed  capi- 
tal. Whenever,  by  reason  of  any  cause  whatever,  the  daily  demand  is  less 
than  the  daily  supply,  the  accumulation  of  unemployed  capital  begins.  There 
are  fewer  houses  built,  and  the  consequence  is,  that  there  is  less  demand  for 
labour,  the  price  of  which  falls,  and  the  power  to  consume  food  and  clothing 
is  diminished.  The  demand  for  iron  and  cotton  is  lessened,  and  furnaces  and 
mills  cease  to  be  built,  and  the  power  to  consume  food  and  clothing  is  thus 
still  further  diminished.  With  each  step  in  this  progress,  there  is  a  tendency 
to  the  accumulation  of  unproductive  capital.  One  man  has  it  in  the  form  of 
iron,  another  in  that  of  cloth,  a  third  in  that  of  labour,  and  a  fourth  has  it 
in  the  form  of  a  debt  due  to  him  by  a  bank  which  pays  him  no  interest.  By 
degrees  the  iron  and  cloth  pass  off  to  be  consumed,  and,  as  their  owners  do 
not  desire  to  reinvest  the  proceeds,  they  take  a  further  credit  on  the  bank, 
which  still  pays  no  interest.  In  this  manner  capital  is  blocked  up,  deposits 
accumulate,  the  rate  of  interest  necessarily  falls,  and  the  prices  of  existing 
securities  rise. 

With  this  rise  comes  a  desire  to  create  more  investments  similar  to  those 
which  still  continue  to  pay  interest,  and  there  is  a  rush  to  seize  on  those  sup- 
posed to  possess  greater  advantages  than  others.  Speculation  begins,  and 
prices  run  up  rapidly.  Having  reached  the  zenith,  the  downward  course  be- 
gins. Thenceforward  the  progress  is  rapid,  and  fortunes  disappear  in  a  mo- 


THE   HARMONY  OF   INTERESTS.  189 

ment,  leaving  not  even  "  a  wreck  behind."  The  capitalist,  after  having  been 
for  a  long  time  deprived  of  interest,  now  loses  the  capital  itself. 

By  the  laws  of  1832  and  1833,  railroad  iron,  French  merchandise  gene- 
rally, linens,  and  other  commodities,  were  freed  from  duty.  Some  descrip- 
tions of  woollen  manufactures  were  reduced  to  ten  per  cent.,  and  a  general 
reduction  was  established,  commencing  in  1833,  and  increasing  biennially 
thereafter,  until  there  should  be  reached  a  uniform  rate  of  20  per  cent. 

The  passage  of  these  laws  diminished  the  demand  for  capital  to  be  employed 
in  the  making  of  iron.  As  they  came  gradually  into  action,  there  was  a  dimi- 
nution in  the  tendency  to  build  mills.  In  place  of  producing  iron  and  cloth, 
we  bought  them  on  credit.  Capital  accumulated,  and  the  prices  of  dividend- 
paying  stocks  rose.  Next,  companies  were  established  for  making  railroads, 
and  States  made  roads  and  canals,  for  which  the  iron  and  cloth  were  bought 
on  credit.  The  difficulty  of  employing  capital  in  the  East  caused  it  to  seek 
investment  in  the  South  and  South-west,  there  to  be  employed  in  the  making 
of  banks  and  roads,  and  there  to  be  sunk  for  ever.  The  day  of  payment 
came.  The  iron  and  cloth  had  been  used,  and  the  certificates  of  debt  given 
in  exchange  for  it  were  abroad.  The  banks  were  heavily  in  debt  to  the  per- 
sons whose  capital  had  accumulated  in  their  hands,  and  not  being  able  to  pay 
they  had  to  stop,  and  thus  commenced  a  period  the  most  disastrous  to  the 
labourers  and  the  owners  of  capital  fixed  in  land,  houses,  and  roads,  that  the 
country  has  ever  seen. 

An  examination  of  the  tables  I  have  furnished  will  show  that,  during  this 
period,  the  productive  power  of  the  country  was  stationary.  Capital  was  in 
demand  for  distant  speculation,  but  for  little  else.  Houses,  ships,  factories, 
mills,  furnaces,  and  all  other  of  the  modes  of  investment  by  which  value  is 
given  to  land,  felt  the  effect  equally,  and  thus,  while  the  labourer  suffered  in 
the  diminution  of  wages,  the  land-holder  suffered  in  the  diminished  value  of 
land.  Had  the  roads  and  canals  of  1835  to  1839  been  based  upon  home- 
made cloth  and  iron,  they  would  have  produced  unmixed  good ;  but  being  made 
with  borrowed  cloth  and  borrowed  iron,  they  were  accompanied  by  a  general 
deterioration  of  condition  throughout  the  community,  resulting  in  the  disgrace 
of  bankruptcy  and  repudiation. 

By  those  who  will  trouble  themselves  to  look  below  the  surface,  it  will 
readily  be  seen  that  the  state  of  things  here  described  is  precisely  that  now 
existing,  and  that  the  process  at  present  going  on  is  the  same  that  brought  ruin 
eight  years  since.  Companies  obtain  large  quantities  of  English  iron  upon 
securities  that  would  not  be  received  in  this  country,  and  when  the  day  of 
defalcation  shall  come,  as  come  it  must,  the  cry  of  American  bankruptcy  will 
be  as  rife  throughout  Europe  as  it  was  but  five  years  since.  Scarcely  a  week 
elapses  that  does  not  bring  with  it  a  notice  like  the  following,  and  yet  the 
quantity  of  iron  consumed  is  less  than  when  it  was  produced  at  home,  and 
paid  for  in  labour  that  is  now  being  wasted. 

"  The  agent  who  went,  to  England,  to  purchase  iron  for  the  Great- Western  Railroad  of 
Illinois,  has  returned  in  the  Cambria,  with  proposals  to  furnish  the  whole  quantity 
required  for  the  road  from  Cairo  to  Chicago,  receiving  in  payment  the  six  per  cent,  ster- 
ling bonds  of  the  Company,  payable  in  London/' 

Capital  is  said  to  be  abundant,  and  interest  is  low — for  fhose  who  have 
unquestionable  securities.  The  reason  is,  that  the  natural  outlets  for  capital 
are  closed.*  Iron  is  superabundant,  and  furnaces  are  not  built.  Coal  is 
superabundant,  and  mines  are  not  opened.  Cotton  cloth  is  superabundant, 
and  mills  are  not  built.  Ships  are  superabundant,  and  the  building  of  ships, 

*  It  would  be  nearly  impossible  to  find  a  mode  of  investment  tending  to  produce  de- 
mand for  labour,  in  which  capital  could  be  profitably  employed,  and  hence  it  is  that  there 
is  so  universal  a  demand  for  bank  charters. 


190  THE   HARMONY  OF   INTERESTS. 

brigs,  and  schooners,  is  diminished.  We  are  buying  on  credit  the  cloth  and 
iron  we  should  be  making,  while  the  labour  and  capital  that  should  be  em- 
ployed in  their  production  seek  in  vain  for  employment.  The  heavy  sufferers 
are,  and  are  to  be,  labour  and  land.  The  broker  takes  his  usual  shave 
for  the  notes  which  pass  through  his  hands,  and  the  grocer  charges  his  usual 
cent  per  pound  on  sugar,  but  the  furnace  is  closed,  and  with  it  the  demand 
for  food  and  labour — the  mine  is  abandoned,  and  the  miner  suffers  from  want 
of  clothing — the  constructor  of  railroads  obtains  no  dividend,  and  the  desire 
to  make  roads  as  an  investment  of  capital  has  passed  away,  and  with  it  the 
demand  for  labour,  food,  and  clothing.  By  degrees,  the  same  results  must 
be  experienced  by  every  interest  of  the  nation.  The  return  to  labour  is 
diminishing,  and  the  value  of  land,  houses,  ships,  railroads,  and  every  other 
species  of  property,  is  dependent  on  the  extent  of  that  return — rising  as  it 
rises,  and  falling  as  it  falls. 

The  nearer  the  consumer  and  the  producer  can  be  brought  to  each  other, 
the  more  perfectly  will  be  the  adjustment  of  production  and  consumption, 
the  more  steady  will  be  the  currency,  and  the  higher  will  be  the  value  of 
land  and  labour.  The  object  of  protection  is  to  accomplish  all  these  objects, 
by  bringing  the  loom  and  the  anvil  to  take  their  natural  places  by  the  side 
of  the  plough  and  the  harrow,  thus  making  a  market  on  the  land  for  the  pro- 
ducts of  the  land.  

Of  all  the  commodities  in  use  by  man,  there  are  none  that  contribute  so 
little  to  his  comfort  or  convenience  as  gold  and  silver.  They  are  useless  for 
the  clearing  or  draining  of  lands,  the  building  of  houses  or  mills,  or  the  con- 
struction of  ships  or  railroads.  They  can  be  neither  eaten,  drunken,  nor  to 
any  extent  worn.  Nevertheless,  of  all  they  are  the  two  whose  arrival  and 
departure  are  most  carefully  chronicled. 

Ten  furnaces  and  rolling-mills,  capable  of  producing  in  a  year  three  mil- 
lions of  dollars'  worth  of  iron,  may  close  without  producing  even  a  passing 
remark  from  a  newspaper,  but  no  vessel  can  arrive  or  depart,  with  fifty 
thousand  dollars  in  gold,  without  the  arrival  being  noticed  in  half  the  papers 
of  the  Union. 

The  factitious  importance  thus  given  to  the  precious  metals  is  one  of  the 
effects  of  the  colonial  system,  which  demands  that  all  the  commodities  of  the 
world  shall  be  brought  to  one  market,  there  to  be  submitted  to  one  standard. 
Its  effects  at  home  have  been  to  make  every  man  a  seller  of  almost  all  he 
produces,  and  a  buyer  of  almost  all  he  consumes.*  "In  our  social  system/* 
says  the  accomplished  traveller,  Mr.  Laing,f  "every  man  buys  all  he  sells, 
and  sells  all  he  produces.  The  very  bread  of  our  labourers,"  he  continues, 
"  is  often  bought  at  the  manufacturer's  shop."  The  system  has  converted  a 
large  portion  of  the  little  occupants  into  hired  labourers,  receiving  from  six  to 
nine  shillings  a  week,|  and  occupying  poor  houses  in  poor  villages,  where 


*  "  The  evil  of  our  economical  system  is,  that  too  many  of  us  live  by  wages.  When 
masters  suffer,  the  servant  starves.  When  wages  stop,  he  has  nothing  to  fall  back  upon. 
When  he  would  eat,  he  has  every  thing  to  buy — and,  wages  stopped,  where  has  he  to 
buy  with?  But  the  seed-time  and  harvest  of  the  spade  husbandman  never  fail  him.  He 
may  lose  a  crop,  but  something  is  still  left.  When  the  slug  takes  his  patch  of  wheat,  he 
can  kill  him,  or  thrust  in  cabbages,  or  barley,  or  vetches,  or  something.  The  cow  will 
yield  her  milk,  whether  ports  are  open,  or  discounts  are  raised.  Take  labour  out  of  the 
market,  and  wages  rise — the  great  body  of  tsonsumers  possess  better  means  of  payment, 
and  manufacturers  and  tradesmen  flourish  by  cheap  food  and  better  wages.  The  farmer 
is  relieved  in  his  rates,  and  the  landlord  gets  a  better  rent  for  his  land." — The  Mother 
Country,  by  Sidney  Smith. 

•J-  Notes  of  a  Traveller,  page  152,  American  edition.          $  See  pages  113 — 117,  ante 


THE   HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS.  191 

they  are  compelled  to  waste  much  of  the  time  that  would,  under  a  different 
one,  be  employed  with  infinite  advantage  to  themselves  and  others.* 

The  man  who  exchanges  directly  with  his  neighbour  food  and  labour  for 
coal  or  iron,  has  little  need  of  money.  He  exchanges  labour  for  labour,  and 
if  the  account  do  not  adjust  itself,  it  is  frequently  balanced  by  the  transfer  of 
the  difference  to  the  credit  of  another,  and  thus  is  there  established  in  every 
community  in  which  men  combine  their  exertions,  a  sort  of  clearing  house, 
quite  as  effective  in  its  operations  as  the  celebrated  one  of  London. f 

The  man  who  sends  his  cotton  to  Liverpool  or  Lowell,  trades  altogether 
for  money.  He  desires  to  know  how  much  gold  he  can  have  for  a  bale,  and 
how  much  iron  he  can  have  for  a  pound  of  gold.  He  uses  machinery  with 
which  the  others  can  dispense. 

Whatever  tends  to  increase  the  quantity  of  machinery  required  for  the 
accomplishment  of  a  given  effect,  tends  to  increase  the  friction  and  augment 
the  power  required  for  its  accomplishment.  Such  is  the  case  here.  The 
necessity  for  using  gold  tends  to  introduce  a  new  and  powerful  cause  of  dis- 
turbance in  the  operations  of  the  planter,  and  greatly  to  augment  the  cost  of 
them,  thus  increasing  the  friction  and  diminishing  the  effect.  Gold  and 
silver  are  reduced  in  weight  by  abrasion,  and  for  all  this  loss  the  producer  and 
the  consumer  pay.  The  exchanger  pays  nothing.  He  lives  at  their  cost. 

Twenty-five  years  since,  we  thought  much  of  gold  or  silver,  for  we  were 

*  "One  principal  cause  of  the  extraordinary  productiveness  of  land,  under  the 
management  of  small  occupiers,  is,  that  all  or  most  of  the  cultivators  are  directly  inte- 
rested in  the  success  of  their  labour ;  they  work  for  themselves,  and  consequently  with 
an  ardour  which  cannot  be  expected  from  hired  labourers.  Every  farmer  might,  how- 
ever, make  his  servants  almost  equally  zealous  in  his  cause  by  altering  the  mode  of  re- 
munerating them.  If,  instead  of  being  paid  a  fixed  rate  of  wages,  they  were  entitled  to 
a  certain  proportion  of  the  crops,  they  would  strive  to  make  the  crops  as  abundant  as 
possible.  *  *  *  Nothing  more  is  wanting  to  cure  over-population  than  to  make  people 
comfortable,  and  to  make  the  continuance  of  their  comforts  dependent  on  themselves." — 
Thornton  on  Over-population. 

•J-  Such  are  "the  protective  societies"  established  in  New  England,  in  which  workmen 
supply  themselves  with  the  various  commodities  required  for  their  consumption.  They 
desire  to  dispense  as  much  as  possible  with  the  services  of  the  exchanger,  as  common 
sense  (would  teach  all  men  to  do.  I  take  the  following  paragraph,  illustrative  of  this 
movement,  from  one  of  the  journals  of  the  day: — 

"  Mr.  Kaulback,  the  purchasing  agent  of  the  several  protective  unions  in  New  England, 
has  paid  for  the  purchase  of  goods  for  the  quarter  ending  January  1J  1850,  the  sum  of 
$102,000,  being  an  increase  of  some  $23,000  over  the  previous  three  months.  This  is  an 
important  branch  of  trade  that  has  recently  grown  up  among  us,  the  more  so  as  it  is  a 
cash  business,  no  credit  in  any  case  ever  being  asked  for.  There  are  now  in  active 
operation  109  union  cash  stores  in  New  England,  nearly  all  stocked  by  the  above-named 
agent. ' ' — Boston  paper. 

One  of  the  most  remarkable  cases  of  combination  of  action  is  now  going  the  rounds  of 
the  newspapers.  Captain  Geo.  Kimball  determined  to  build  a  ship  in  a  remote  district 
of  Maine,  and  there,  "alone,  a  company  of  one,  without  capital,  in  a  forest,  at  a  distance 
even  from  deep  water,  he  commenced  his  noble  enterprise.  He  was  soon  joined  by  a 
single  man,  in  a  few  weeks  others  followed  ;  women  contributed  provisions,  and  the 
farmers  sent  in  cattle  which  were  exchanged  for  materials  for  ship-building.  The  no- 
velty of  the  undertaking  attracted  adventurers  from  a  distance,  and  experienced  ship- 
builders and  joiners  arrived  to  give  their  strength  and  skill  to  the  work.  All  who  aided 
in  the  enterprise,  whether  men,  women,  or  children,  received  their  proportionate  share 
in  the  ship.  In  April  last  the  work  was  commenced,  and  in  November  she  was  launched, 
n  splendid  ship  of  more  than  six  hundred  tons  burden,  and  christened  the  '  California 
Pncket.1  She  is  now  in  Boston  with  her  passengers  on  board,  those  who  built  and  own 
her,  and  to  whom  she  is  now  a  home.  We  need  not  say  that  the  men  and  women  who 
compose  this  company  are  specimens  of  our  New  England  population,  to  whom  we  can 
refer  with  pride.1' — Boston  Transcript. 


192  THE   HARMONY  OF   INTERESTS. 

then  obliged  to  export  them.  Under  the  tariff  of  1828,  we  imported  them, 
and  then  they  were  little  the  subjects  of  thought.  Under  the  Compromise, 
there  came  a  demand  for  so  much  coin  that  we  became  bankrupt,  and  then 
came  a  rage  for  gold.  Under  the  tariff  of  1842,  we  imported  much  gold, 
and  the  idea  ceased  to  occupy  the  public  mind.  Under  the  tariff  of  1846, 
we  have  exported  much,  and  have  run  largely  in  debt,  preparatory  to  a  de- 
mand for  gold.  When  that  shall  come,  it  will  again  be  sought  for  as  it  was 
in  1842. 

Among  the  evidences  of  the  wastefulness  of  the.  existing  system  may  be 
found  the  rage  for  increasing  the  number  of  places  at  which  gold  is  to  be 
weighed  and  marked — called  mints.  The  mint  neither  adds  to  the  quantity 
nor  improves  the  quality  of  the  thing  that  is  minted,  and  yet  it  is  now  pro- 
posed to  spend  six  or  eight  hundred  thousand  dollars  in  making  an  addition 
to  the  number  of  buildings  in  which  this  work  is  to  be  performed,  although 
there  are  now  far  more  than  are  needed  for  the  work  that  is  to  be  done. 
The  object  in  view  is  the  saving  of  freight  and  interest.  Were  the  govern- 
ment to  receive  bullion  in  New  York,  paying  for  it  at  full  price,  and  then  to 
transport  it  at  its  own  cost  back  and  forth,  the  freight  and  interest  would  not 
amount  to  half  as  much  as  the  salaries  of  the  officers,  and  were  the  same 
capital  applied  to  the  building  of  furnaces,  it  would  erect  as  many  as  would 
produce  as  much  iron  as  would  pay  for  more  than  half  the  gold  and  silver 
coined  in  the  year  1848,  the  amount  of  which  was  $4,450,000.  It  is  time 
that  the  planters  and  farmers  of  the  Union  should  look  to  these  matters  for 
themselves,  for  they  it  is  that  have  to  suffer  by  the  waste  of  capital. 

Striking  evidence  of  the  diminishing  power  of  the  people  of  Great  Britain 
and  Ireland  to  obtain  the  comforts  and  conveniences  of  life,  may  be  found  in 
the  following  statement  of  the  quantity  of  gold  and  silver  plate,  including,  of 
course,  spoons,  forks,  and  other  articles  of  daily  use,  stamped  at  the  follow- 
ing periods : 

Tear.  Population.  Gold-plate  ounces.  Sil  vcr-plate  ounce*.      Value  of  bullion  per  bead 

1801—10  17,000,000  5,471  1,018,147  6$  cents. 

1810—29  21,000,000  6,926  l',209,616  6§     « 

1839—47  28,000,000  7,011  1,118,550  4-45" 

The  last  thirty  years  have  witnessed  the  passage  of  a  series  of  laws  tend- 
ing to  compel  the  people  to  use  more  gold  and  silver ;  yet,  with  the  exten- 
sion of  the  system,  their  ability  to  be  customers  to  the  men  who  mine 
those  metals  has  declined  almost  one-third.  The  market  of  the  miner  is  di- 
minishing as  well  as  that  of  the  planter. 

With  the  diminution  of  the  necessities  of  man  there  is  a  constant  increase 
of  his  powers.  The  furnace  and  the  mill  dimmish  his  necessity  for  going  to 
the  distant  market,  while  giving  him  roads  by  which  to  seek  it  at  his  pleasure. 
The  ship  brings  immigrants  to  eat  the  food  and  wear  the  cotton,  and  the 
freight  received  from  them  tends  largely  to  diminish  the  cost  of  sending  food 
and  cotton  to  distant  lands.  So  is  it  with  gold.  The  nearer  the  consumer 
and  producer  can  be  brought  together,  the  less  is  the  necessity  for  it,  and  the 
greater  the  power  of  obtaining  it.  The  tendency  of  the  tariff  of  1846  is  to 
increase  the  necessity  for  it  and  diminish  the  power  of  obtaining  it,  because  it 
to  diminish  the  value  of  both  land  and  labour. 


THE   HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS.  193 


CHAPTER  EIGHTEENTH. 
HOW   PROTECTION   AFFECTS   THE   FRIENDS   OF   PEACE. 

THE  more  spades  and  ploughs  employed,  the  larger  is  the  return  to  labour. 
The  more  perfectly  peace  is  maintained,  the  greater  is  the  number  of  persons 
who  may  employ  themselves  with  spades  and  ploughs,  the  more  rapid  must 
be  the  increase  of  production,  and  the  larger  must  be  the  reward  of  the 
labourer  and  the  capitalist. 

The  more  swords  and  muskets  employed,  the  smaller  must  be  the  return  to 
labour.  The  more  wars  are  made,  the  greater  must  be  the  number  of  persons 
employing  swords  and  muskets,  the  slower  must  be  the  increase  of  produc- 
tion, and  the  smaller  must  be  the  reward  of  the  labourer  and  the  capitalist. 

Protection  is  said  to  be  a  "  war  upon  labour  and  capital."  If  it  be  so,  it 
must  tend  to  promote  war.  We  are  urged  to  adopt  measures  for  maintaining  the 
monopoly  system  of  England,  and  are  assured  that,  by  doing  so,  we  shall  contri- 
bute to  the  establishment  of  peace.  To  prove  that  such  would  be  the  effect, 
it  would  be  n'ecessary  to  show  that  the  colonial  system  had  heretofore  tended 
to  the  accomplishment  of  that  great  end. 

If,  however,  we  examine  what  has  been  the  cause  of  most  of  the  wars  of 
the  last  hundred  and  fifty  years,  we  shall  find  that  it  has  been  the  desire  for 
the  possession  of  colonies  whose  people  could  be  made  "  customers,"  and 
thus  taxed  for  the  support  of  the  country  that  ruled  over  them.  France  had 
Canada,  and  she  desired  the  country  west  of  the  Mississippi ;  she  had  islands  in 
the  West  Indies,  and  she  wanted  more.  England  had  some  and  wanted  more. 
France  and  England  were  both  in  India,  and,  to  settle  the  question  which  should 
tax  the  whole,  that  country  was  desolated  by  the  march  of  contending  armies 
during  a  long  series  of  yearsv  France  had  colonies  to  lose,  and  hence  the  war  of 
1793.  France  wanted  colonies  in  the  Mediterranean,  and  hence  the  rupture 
of  the  peace  of  Amiens,  and  the  series  of  wars  that  closed  with  Waterloo. 
Since  that  time  we  have  had  a  succession  of  wars  in  India  for  the  extension 
of  British  power  over  Ceylon,  Siam,  Affghanistan,  Scinde,  and  the  Punjaub. 
The  chief  object  of  the  war  with  China  was  that  of  compelling  her  to  open 
her  ports  to  foreign  commerce,  and  it  was  accounted  a  righteous  enterprise 
thus  to  compel  the  poor  Chinese  to  open  their  eyes  to  the  blessings  of  free 
trade.  At  the  Cape,  the  war  with  the  Caffres  has  cost  millions.  France, 
not  to  be  outdone,  seized  on  Tahiti,  and  deposed  its  poor  queen;  and  at 
this  moment  makes  war  on  the  poor  Sandwich  Islanders,  because  they  will 
not  permit  her  to  do  with  brandy  as  England  in  China  did  with  opium.  One 
portion  of  the  English  nation  sells  powder  to  the  people  of  Africa,  to  enable 
them  to  carry  on  wars  in  which  they  make  prisoners,  who  are  sold  as  slaves, 
while  another  portion  watches  the  coast  to  see  that  the  slaves  shall  not  be 
transferred  to  Cuba  or  Brazil.  The  anxiety  for  colonies  has  caused  the  waste 
of  hundreds  of  thousands  of  lives,  and  hundreds  of  millions  on  the  worthless 
Algeria.  Thus  everywhere  it  is  the  same ;  everywhere  the  anxiety  for  trade 
is  seen  stimulating  nations  to  measures  tending  to  the  impoverishment  and 
destruction  of  their  fellow-men. 

The  power  to  make  war  depends  upon  the  high  or  low  valuation  of  man. 
Russia  makes  war  readily,  because  men  are  cheap.  France  supports  large 
armies  at  small  cost.  The  East  India  Company's  army  consists  of  many 
hundred  thousand  men.  Men  in  India  are  cheap.  Belgium  supports  but  a 
small  army,  because  men  are  more  valuable.  England  is  weighed  down  by 
her  fleets  and  armies,  because  wages  are  higher  than  on  the  continent,  and 
she  is  therefore  compelled  to  depend  on  voluntary  enlistment.  Could  the 
price  of  men  be  raised,  she  would  be  compelled  to  dispense  with  fleets  and 


194  THE   HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS. 

armies,  and  the  necessity  for  colonies  would  cease  to  exist.  Throughout  the 
world,  armies  have  been  large  where  men  were  held  of  small  account,  and 
throughout  they  have  tended  to  become  less  valuable  as  armies  became  more 
numerous. 

The  cause  of  war  is  to  be  found  in  the  diminished  or  diminishing  produc- 
tiveness of  labour,  as  our  own  experience  shows.  The  increasing  difficulty 
of  obtaining  the  means  of  support,  from  1835  to  1842,  produced  the  dispersion 
of  men  that  led  to  the  war  in  Florida,  the  occupation  of  Texas  and  Oregon,  the 
difficulty  with  Great  Britain,  the  war  with  Mexico,  and  the  occupation  of 
California;  and  this  latter  is  now  leading  us  into  discussions  with  Great  Britain 
about  the  rights  of  the  Mosquito  king,  which,  but  for  the  dispersion  to  Cali- 
fornia, would  interest  us  little  more  than  would  those  of  the  King  of  Bantam. 
The  colonial  system  is  with  us,  as  with  all,  the  avenue  to  war,  because  it 
tends  to  diminish  the  value  of  labour  and  land. 

When  we  look  to  the  internal  condition  of  those  nations  that,  from  an  anx- 
iety for  "ships,  colonies,  and  commerce,"  have  been  always  engaged  in  wars, 
we  find  it  a  scene  of  universal  discord.  Louis  Philippe  maintained  fleets 
and  armies,  engaged  at  one  time  in  the  subjugation  of  Algeria,  and  at  others 
in  the  seizure  of  Tahiti,  and  in  similar  enterprises  elsewhere.  The  unpro- 
ductive class  increased  in  numbers,  and  the  burden  to  be  borne  by  the  pro- 
ductive class  increased  in  weight  until  the  explosion  of  1848,  followed  by 
barricades  of  towns,  and  by  a  series  of  disturbances  producing  a  necessity 
for  increasing  still  further  the  number  of  unproductive  consumers,  men  car- 
rying muskets,  required  to  secure  the  maintenance  of  internal  peace.  Eng- 
land maintains  large  fleets  and  armies  for  the  protection  of  commerce  and 
colonies,  and  her  whole  empire  is  "  a  scene  of  rude  commotion."  At  home, 
we  see  her  chartists  attempting  revolution;  in  Ireland,  monster  meetings 
and  efforts  at  separation,  followed  by  appeals  to  arms ;  in  Canada,  efforts  at 
revolution,  followed  by  the  present  determination  to  effect  peaceable  separa- 
tion ;  in  the  West  Indies,  universal  discord  among  the  employers  and  the 
employed;  in  India,  perpetual  difficulties,  and  everywhere  a  necessity  for 
maintaining  large  armies  for  the  purpose  of  maintaining  internal  peace,  or,  in 
other  words,  for  preventing  those  who  have  property  from  being  plundered  by 
those  who  have  it  not,  and  enabling  those  who  are  strong  to  tax  those  who 
are  weak. 

With  the  gradual  diminution  in  the  productive  power  of  the  people  of 
England,  we  see  an  increase  of  discord  between  the  employers  and  the  em- 
ployed ;  strikes  becoming  more  numerous,  and  accompanied  by  more  serious 
results,  the  destruction  of  buildings  and  machinery  being  added  to  the  injury 
resulting  from  long  suspensions  of  labour.  In  Scotland,  the  population  of 
whole  districts  is  expelled  to  make  way  for  sheep,  while  other  districts  pre- 
sent to  view  outrages  similar  to  those  exhibited  in  the  lands  further  South. 
In  Ireland,  we  see  a  scene  of  almost  universal  war,  the  land-holder  in  one 
place  expelling  his  tenants  and  destroying  their  houses^  while  in  thousands 
of  others  tenants  are  seen  carrying  off  and  secreting  their  crops,  to  avoid  the 
payment  of  rent. 

If  we  look  at  home,  we  see  similar  events  resulting  from  every  attempt  to 
throw  down  the  barrier  of  protection  and  assimilate  our  system  to  that  which 
has  produced  the  ruin  of  the  British  colonies.  At  no  period  of  our  history 
has  there  prevailed  such  universal  discord  among  employers  and  employed 
as  during  the  last  few  years  of  the  Compromise  act.  The  productiveness  of 
labour  was,  as  we  have  seen,  gradually  diminishing,  and  the  employers  were 
unable  to  pay  to  the  employed  such  wages  as  would  enable  them  to  obtain 
the  same  amount  of  conveniences  and  comforts  as  they  had  before  enjoyed. 
The  year  that  has  now  closed  has  been  signalized  by  the  same  state  of  things 


THE   HARMONY  OF  INTERESTS.  195 

throughout  the  coal  region,  as  labour  became  less  productive.  At  one  time 
we  have  had  turn-outs  among  coal  operators,  and  at  another  among  miners 
and  labourers,  and  the  result  has  been  that  the  year  has  been  one  of  almost 
total  loss. 

If  we  compare  with  this  the  period  that  elapsed  between  1844  and  1847, 
we  see  in  the  latter  a  steady  increase  in  the  productive  power,  attended  by  an 
increasing  tendency  to  harmony  among  employers  and  employed,  the  natural 
result  of  improvement  of  condition. 

The  exhaustion  resulting  from  the  maintenance  of  the  colonial  system  thus 
produces  a  tendency  to  turbulence  and  radicalism  that  compels  the  mainte- 
nance of  armies,  followed  by  further  exhaustion,  and  all  the  injurious  results 
are  borne  by  labour  and  land.  Consumption  cannot  exceed  production,  and 
whatever  decreases  the  proportion  which  hands  to  produce  bear  to  mouths  to 
be  fed  and  backs  to  be  clothed,  diminishes  the  share  of  food  and  clothing  that  falls 
to  each.  England  now  raises  almost  seventy  millions  of  taxes,  very  many  of 
which  are  required  for  the  payment  of  those  employed  in  the  work  of  collecting 
the  remaining  millions  that  are  paid  into  the  treasury.  To  these  millions  raised 
by  the  State  must  now  be  added  eight  millions  for  the  support  of  one-ninth  of 
the  population  of  England  who  are  paupers,  and  many  more  for  the  support  of 
the  paupers  of  Ireland.  Here  is  a  burden  of  above  four  hundred  millions 
of  dollars,  the  whole  weight  of  which  is  to  be  borne  by  the  labour  and  land 
of  England  and  of  the  world,  and  ultimately  by  her  land  alone.  The  people 
can  fly,  but  the  land  cannot.  The  power  to  pay  rent  depends  upon  the  power 
to  make  the  land  produce,  and,  as  that  increases  with  increase  of  numbers, 
and  improvement  in  the  physical,  moral,  and  intellectual  condition  of  the 
labourer,  it  diminishes  with  diminution  of  numbers  and  deterioration  of  con- 
dition. In  the  three  years  ending  with  1845,  the  consumption  of  spirits, 
domestic  and  colonial,  amounted  to  .  .  .  .  23,422,295  galls. 
In  the  three  years  ending  in  1848,  it  was  .  .  .  25,326,861*  " 
showing  a  tendency  to  inebriation  increasing  with  the  diminishing  power  to 
obtain  in  return  for  labour  a  suitable  reward. 

Demoralization  produces  pauperism,  and  pauperism  increases  demoraliza- 
tion, and  the  inebriate  paupers  must  be  supported  out  of  the  products  of  the 
land.  The  surplus  food  of  Russia  has  diminished  cultivation  in  Ireland,  and 
has,  of  course,  diminished  production.  England  is  now  overrun  with  Irish 
labourers  and  paupers,  and  what  has  happened  in  Ireland  must  follow  in 
England.  More  corn  will  continue  to  be  imported,  and  more  cotton  goods 
will  be  exported ;  but  the  products  of  the  land,  out  of  which  rent  and  taxes 
are  to  be  paid,  will  diminish,  and,  while  the  mouths  to  be  fed  will  increase 
in  number,  the  food  with  which  they  are  to  be  fed  will  continue  to  diminish 
in  quantity.  The  corn-laws  constituted  the  barrier  of  the  land-holders  of 
England  against  the  effects  of  the  system  by  which  England  was  deteriorat- 
ing the  value  of  labour  and  land  throughout  the  world.  Their  abolition  tends 
to  bring  it  daily  more  and  more  upon  themselves,  and  the  only  remedy  is  to 
be  found  in  the  abolition  of  the  colonial  system  and  the  suppression  of  the 
fleets  and  armies  which  its  existence  renders  necessary.  The  diminution  of 
unproductive  consumers  will  be  attended  by  an  increase  of  productive  ones, 
and  the  exports  of  England  will  then  again  represent  home-grown  food,  to 
be  returned  in  sugar,  tea,  coffee,  and  cotton,  and  with  every  step  in  that  di- 
rection the  necessity  for  taxes  will  diminish,  and  the  power  to  pay  them  will 
increase. 

If  we  look  at  home,  we  see  a  tendency  to  increase  in  the  necessity  for  taxa- 

*  This  fact  is  adduced  by  the  Edinburgh  Review,  July,  1849,  as  one  of  the  evidences 
of  the  advantage  resulting  from  free  trade. 


196  THE   HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS. 

tion  with  every  step  towards  subjection  to  the  colonial  system,  and  dimi- 
nished tendency  thereto  as  we  move  in  the  opposite  direction.  The  ex- 
penses of  the  government  under  the  administration  of  Mr.  Monroe  averaged 
thirteen  millions.  Those  of  the  administration  of  Mr.  Adams  averaged  little 
over  twelve  millions.  During  the  existence  of  the  tariff  of  1828,  and  in  the 
early  period  of  the  Compromise,  we  find  the  expenditure  maintained  at  thir- 
teen millions,  but  with  the  gradual  dispersion  of  population  we  arrive  at 
the  Florida  war,  and  an  expenditure  of  thirty,  thirty-seven,  and  thirty-three 
millions  in  three  successive  years,  and  afterwards  falling  gradually  until  we 
find  it  at  twenty  millions  in  the  period  of  1843  to  1844.  With  the  adop- 
tion of  free-trade  doctrines,  we  find  an  increasing  tendency  to  war,  and  the 
expenditure  rising  to  sixty  millions.  Looking  at  all  these  facts,  it  is  difficult 
to  arrive  at  any  other  conclusion  than  that  protection  tends  to  increase  the 
demand  for  spades  and  ploughs,  and  the  reward  of  labour,  and  to  diminish 
that  demand  for  swords  and  muskets  which  leads  to  the  destruction  of  both 
the  labourer  and  the  plough.  The  friend  of  peace  is  therefore  directly 
interested  in  the  destruction  of  the  English  monopoly  of  machinery. 

If  protection  be  a  war  upon  labour  and  capital,  we  should  find  it  attended 
with  diminished  production  and  increased  expenditures.  If,  on  the  contrary, 
it  be,  as  its  name  imports,  protection  to  both  labourer  and  capitalist,  tending 
to  augment  the  value  of  the  labourer,  then  it  should  be  attended  with  in- 
creased production  and  diminished  expenditure.  We  have  now  before  us 
the  fact,  that,  while  the  government,  from  1824  to  1833,  was  administered 
at  about  one  dollar  per  head,  the  cost  of  administration  rose  in  the  free-trade 
period  to  more  than  two  dollars,  to  fall  again  to  one  in  the  period  of  pro- 
tection, and  to  rise  to  almost  three  in  the  present  free-trade  one.*  Protection 
looks  homeward.  Free  trade,  under  existing  circumstances,  looks  abroad,  and 
needs  fleets  and  armies,  with  hosts  of  officers,  great  custom-houses  and  ware- 
houses, branch  mints  in  California  and  New  York,  ministers  plenipotentiary 
and  charge's  without  number  abroad,  and  hosts  of  officers  at  home,  to  be  sup- 
ported out  of  the  proceeds  of  labour  and  land.  The  one  looks  to  cheap  and 
good  government ;  the  other  to  a  splendid  one,  profitable  to  the  governors, 
but  fatal  to  the  governed. 

We  have  seen  that  under  protection  the  value  of  labour  at  home  has  in- 
creased, and  that  therewith  there  has  been  an  increase  in  the  power  of  con- 
suming foreign  commodities,  such  as  we  do  not  ourselves  produce.  We  have 
also  seen  that  while  it  tends  to  increase  the  importation  of  people  from  abroad, 
it  tends  likewise  to  facilitate  the  transmission  to  Europe  of  our  bulky  com- 
modities, by  enabling  us  to  send  them  at  almost  nominal  freights,  and  that 
thus,  while  it  raises  the  value  of  labour  throughout  the  world  by  diminishing 
the  number  of  persons  seeking  employment,  it  also  raises  it  by  enabling  those 
who  remain  abroad  to  obtain  sugar,  cotton,  coffee,  and  the  other  productions 
of  the  West,  at  diminished  cost.  The  way  to  promote  harmony  among 
nations,  and  in  the  bosom  of  nations,  is  to  increase  the  value  of  man,  and 
such  has  been,  and  must  continue  to  be  the  result  of  protection.  That  object 
once  accomplished,  all  necessity  for  custom-houses,  whether  for  protection  or 
for  revenue,  will  cease. 

The  man  who  contributes  to  the  support  of  war  makes  war,  and  if  he  does 
it  voluntarily  he  is  accountable  for  the  results  thereof  in  the  deterioration  and 

*  Independently  of  the  amount  of  money  paid  for  the  expenses  of  the  Mexican  war 
And  the  purchase  of  California,  ninety  thousand  land  warrants  have  been  issued  to  sol 
diers  who  served  in  the  war,  giving  to  them  as  bounty  13,800,000  acres.  Estimating 
this  land  at  the  government  price,  $1  25  an  acre,  we  have  an  aggregate  of  $17,230.0OO 


THE   HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS.  197 

destruction  of  his  fellow-men.  Of  all  the  people  of  the  world,  there  are  non« 
who  have  contributed  so  largely  as  ourselves  to  the  maintenance  of  the  fleets 
and  armies  by  which  Ireland  has  been  ruined,  and  war  has  been  carried 
throughout  Europe  and  Asia.  So  far  as  we  have  done  this  voluntarily,  we 
are  as  much  responsible  for  the  destruction  of  life  and  property  in  China, 
Scinde,  Affghanistan,  and  the  Punjaub,  as  the  men  by  whose  command  these 
things  were  done. 

We  have  seen  that  England  produces  little  to  export,  yet  is  she  enabled  to 
consume  much.  The  producer  obtains  little  for  his  cotton,  yet  the  labourer 
obtains  little  clothing  for  the  time  employed  in  converting  the  cotton  into 
cloth.  The  sugar-planter  obtains  little  iron  for  his  sugar,  yet  the  miner  has 
little  sugar  for  his  labour.  The  tobacco-grower  has  little  cloth  for  his  pro- 
duct, but  the  spinner  can  consume  little  tobacco.  The  reason  for  all  this  is 
to  be  found  in  the  fact  that  between  the  consumer  and  the  producer  stands  a 
host  of  exchangers,  the  greatest  of  which  is  that  which  collects  taxes  to  be 
paid  out  for  the  support  of  fleets  and  armies.  Every  pound  of  cotton  that  travels 
on  an  English  railway,  contributes  its  proportion  to  the  £108,000  of  taxes 
paid  by  the  single  London  and  North-western  railway,  the  £68,000  paid  by 
the  Great  Western,*  or  some  other  of  the  immense  sums  paid  by  other  rail- 
ways. Every  pound  of  tobacco  pays  3s.  =  72  cents,  towards  the  mainte- 
nance of  the  fleets  and  armies  of  Great  Britain,  in  addition  to  its  share  of  the 
taxes  on,  warehouses,  bills  of  exchange,  promissory  notes,  and  of  the  thousand 
other  taxes  paid  by  the  various  persons  wlio  stand  between  the  producer  and 
the  consumer.  These  men  produce  nothing  themselves,  and  their  taxes  must 
be  paid  for  them  by  the  land  and  labour  that  do  produce — whether  it  be 
foreign  or  domestic. 

England  is  now  the  great  war-making  power  of  the  world.  It  is  by  means 
of  the  monopoly  of  machinery  for  the  production  of  iron,  and  for  the  conver- 
sion of  cotton  into  cloth,  that  she  is  enabled  to  tax  the  world  for  the  mainte- 
nance of  her  fleets  and  armies,  f  for  the  prosecution  of  those  wars.  To  destroy 
her  power  to  make  war  would  be  to  bring  about  peace.  Protection  tends  to 
limit  her  power  to  tax  the  farmers  and  planters  of  the  world,  and  thus  to 
limit  her  power  to  raise  revenue  for  the  payment  of  soldiers  and  sailors,  while 
it  tends  to  raise  the  value  of  man,  and  thus  make  soldiers  and  sailors  more 
costly.  In  both  ways  it  tends  to  diminish  the  power  to  maintain  fleets  and 
armies,  and  to  promote  the  maintenance  of  peace.  Every  friend  of  peace  is 
therefore  bound  to  use  his  efforts  for  the  destruction  of  the  monopoly  system. 

The  London  Times  recently  published,  with  approbation,  a  letter  from  the 
East  Indies — from  a  British  officer  engaged  in  the  battle  of  Goodjerat,  from 
which  the  following  is  an  extract.  It  is  deserving  the  careful  consideration 
of  every  man  who  has  heretofore  aided  in  the  maintenance  of  the  system  :— 

"  The  enemy  were  in  the  sands  trying  to  escape,  and  our  men  knocking  them  over  likt 
dogs.  .  .  Some  of  our  men  screamed  out,  <  They  are  off!'  Fordyce's  troops  went  off  at  a 
gallop,  our  men  giving  them  three  cheers — such  cheers — it  was  a  perfect  scream  of  delight 
and  eagerness  !  and  you  may  be  sure  I  assisted  and  yelled  till  I  was  hoarse  !  .  .  .  Every 
wounded  Sikh  was  either  shot  or  bayoneted  (! !)  .  .  1  rushed  up  with  a  few  of  the 
grenadiers,  and  found  four  men  re-loading  their  pieces  ;  three  were  bayoneted,  and  I  wot 
hacking  away  at  the  head  of  the  fourth,  when  Compton,  of  the  grenadiers,  shot  him.  The 

•  North  British  Review,  August,  1849. 

f  fir  Charles  Napier  has  addressed  a  letter  to  the  public,  which  fills  five  closely 
printed  columns  of  the  Times,  upon  the  subject  of  the  navy  and  its  expenses.  The  sum 
and  substance  of  what  he  says  seems  to  be,  « that  we  have  spent  about  ninety  million! 
sterling  during  the  last  twenty-eight  years  in  rebuilding  our  navy  twice  over,  and  now  we 
cannot  even  find  the  fragments."  Such  are  the  results  of  the  system  of  "  ships,  coloniei, 
and  commerce." 


198  THE   HARMONY  OF   INTERESTS. 

last  shot  was  fired  at  an  unfortunate  Goorer  in  the  camp,  who  was  seated  quietly  reading 
their  Grunth !  .  .  .  We  waited  at  this  place  about  two  hours ;  and  I  can  assure  you  they 
were  about  the  jolliett  two  hourt  1  ever  passed.  I  never  enjoyed  a  bottle  of  beer  so  much 
in  all  my  life!" 

CHAPTER  NINETEENTH. 
HOW  PROTECTION   AFFECTS  THE   EXCHANGER. 

THE  exchanger  stands  between  the  producer  and  the  consumer.  He  him- 
self produces  nothing,  although  consuming  much,  in  exchange  for  winch  he 
gives  only  services.  He  buys  a  bale  of  cloth  and  divides  it  among  the  con- 
sumers, giving  a  piece  to  one  and  a  yard  to  another,  but  he  makes  no 
change  in  the  quantity  or  quality  of  the  commodities  that  pass  through  his 
hands.  The  bale  of  cloth  would  clothe  as  many  men,  and  the  cargo  of  flour 
would  feed  as  many,  without  his  services,  as  with  them.  Nevertheless,  the 
exchanger  takes  rank  before  the  producer.  The  merchants  of  London,  of 
New  York,  and  of  Boston,  have  more  influence  over  the  action  of  govern- 
ment, and  over  public  opinion,  than  twenty,  fifty,  or  even  one  hundred  times 
the  number  of  men  whose  every  hour  is  given  to  increasing  the  quantity  and 
improving  the  quality  of  things  necessary  to  the  use  of  man. 

The  reason  that  such  is  the  case  is  that  the  present  system  of  trade  tends 
to  increase  the  necessities  of  the  producers  for  going  to  distant  markets,  and 
to  diminish  their  power  so  to  do.  When  the  producer  of  iron  takes  his  place 
by  the  side  of  his  producer  of  food,  the  latter  exchanges  his  potatoes,  his  cab- 
bages, his  veal,  his  milk,  and  his  butter,  directly  with  the  former,  and  obtains 
his  iron  at  little  cost  of  labour.  He  is  thereby  enabled  to  improve  his  wagon 
and  his  roads,  and  to  go  to  market  cheaply,  thus  increasing  his  powers  while 
diminishing  his  necessities.  The  more  distant  the  consumer  and  the  producer, 
the  greater  must  be  the  quantity  of  machinery  of  exchange,  and  the  poorer 
must  be  its  quality,  and  every  such  change  in  regard  to  either  tends  to  the 
impoverishment  of  the  farmer  and  planter. 

Such  being  the  case,  it  might  be  supposed  tha,t  here  was  a  case  of  discord. 
The  exchangers  would  suffer  by  the  adoption  of  measures  tending  to  bring 
the  consumers  to  take  their  places  by  each  other.  Directly  the  reverse,  how- 
ever, is  the  fact.  The  quantity  to  be  exchanged  depends  on  the  extent  of 
the  surplus  that  is  produced,  and  that  increases  with  prodigious  rapidity  as 
the  power  of  production  is  increased.  The  man  who  produces  no  more  food 
than  is  absolutely  necessary  for  his  own  consumption,  has  nothing  to  exchange 
for  cloth  or  iron.  Once  fed,  he  may  exchange  the  whole  surplus,  whatever 
it  be,  and  therefore  it  is  that  the  amount  of  exchanges  increases  with  such 
wonderful  rapidity  when  production  increases,  as  was  the  case  from  1843  to 
1847. 

The  larger  the  return  to  labour  applied  to  production,  the  less  must  be  the 
necessity  for  seeking  employment  in  the  work  of  exchange,  and  the  less  will 
be  the  competition  in  trade.  Our  cities  are  filled  with  young  men  from  the 
country  who  would  have  remained  at  home  among  parents  and  friends,  had 
the  cotton  or  woollens  factory,  the  furnace  or  the  rolling-mill,  been  there  to 
give  them  employment ;  but  as  it  was  not  there,  they  have  been  compelled 
to  add  themselves  to  the  already  almost  infinite  number  of  clerks,  hoping, 
and  vainly  hoping,  to  obtain  stores  or  shops  for  themselves.  By  bringing 
the  consumer  to  the  side  of  the  producer,  such  young  men  would,  in  future, 
remain  at  home  to  swell  the  number  of  producers,  and  to  increase  the  amount 
of  production,  enabling  each  exchanger  to  perform  a  larger  amount  of  busi 
ness,  and  to  grow  rich  with  the  same  rate  of  commission  that  now  keeps  him 
poor 


THE   HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS.  199 

It  is  asserted  that  of  all  the  persons  engaged  in  trade,  in  our  cities,  four- 
fifths  fail.  The  cause  is  to  be  found  in  the  fact  that  so  many  are  forced 
into  trade,  for  want  of  being  enabled  to  apply  themselves  to  production,  and 
that  when  there  they  are  exposed  to  the  effects  of  the  enormous  changes 
which  result  from  the  existence  of  the  English  monopoly  system.  Iron 
sells  at  one  time  at  ten  pounds,  and  soon  after  at  five.  The  man  of  small 
capital,  who  has  a  stock  on  hand,  is  ruined.  Cottons  and  woollens  change  in 
like  manner.  At  one  moment  England  desires  to  sell  iron  and  cloth  in  ex- 
change for  certificates  of  debt,  and  money  is  said  to  be  plenty.  At  the  next, 
she  asks  to  be  paid,  and  money  becomes  scarce.  The  little  capitalist  is 
ruined  by  the  change.  The  consequence  is,  that  our  cities  are  filled  with 
men  who  have  adventured  in  trade,  and  failed. 

In  England,  these  disastrous  effects  are  far  more  widely  felt.  The  country 
is  filled  with  young  men  anxious  to  be  employed  in  any  department  bf 
trade,  for  in  the  work  of  production  can  be  found  no  demand  for  time  or 
mind,  unless  accompanied  with  large  capital.  The  consequence  is  a  perpe- 
tual strife  for  obtaining  even  the  means  of  subsistence,  among  •  shopmen, 
clerks,  and  journeymen,*  while  the  unceasing  changes  carry  ruin,  at  brief 
intervals,  among  the  employers.  The  last  three  years  have  seen  to  disappear 
a  large  number  of  the  principal  trading  firms  in  the  kingdom,  and  the 
exhibits  they  have  made  of  their  affairs  afford  proof  conclusive  of  the  ruinous 
character  of  the  system.  In  Liverpool,  at  one  time,  there  were  7000  houses 
and  stores  unoccupied.  What  had  become  of  those  who  had  been  their  occu- 
pants ? 

The  tendency  of  the  whole  system  is  to  produce  a  necessity  for  trade,  and 
to  diminish  the  power  to  maintain  trade.  "  Commerce,"  there,  "  is  king," 
and  like  other  kings,  he  is  exhausting  his  own  subjects.  Having  plundered 
and  ruined  India,  the  West  Indies,  Ireland,  Portugal,  and  all  other  countries 
subject  to  his  control,  he  is  now  doing  the  same  at  home.  With  every  step 
he  is  diminishing  the  power  of  applying  labour  to  production,  and  increasing 
the  necessity  for  looking  to  trade  as  the  only  means  of  employing  time, 
talent,  or  capital,  with  constantly  decreasing  return  to  all ;  and  hance  it  is 
that  so  large  a  portion  of  the  people  of  the  United  Kingdom  desire  to  escape 
to  other  lands,  where  Commerce,  finding  in  agriculture  and  manufactures  his 
equals,  cannot  be  king.  In  his  proper  place  he  is  most  useful,  but  as 
master  he  has  always  proved  a  tyrant  worse  than  any  recorded  even  in  the 
annals  of  Rome.  The  object  of  the  colonial  system  was  that  of  making 
him  master,  and  its  effects  are  now  felt  at  home  as  well  as  abroad.  The 
object  of  protection  is  to  put  an  end  to  his  tyranny,  and  to  bring  him  back 
to  his  true  condition ;  and  among  the  whole  people  there  are  none  whose 
interests  are  more  to  be  promoted  by  the  accomplishment  of  that  object  than 
those  who  are  now  engaged  in  commerce,  because  with  every  step  it  will  in- 
crease the  amount  of  exchanges  to  be  performed,  without  a  corresponding 
increase  in  the  number  of  exchangers. 

*  «  Fourteen  hundred  tailors  are  now  in  London  totally  unemployed,  and  hundreds  daily 
applying  for  relief  to  the  houses  of  call;  the  funds  are,  however,  exhausted.  Nine  hun- 
dred shoemakers  out  of  work  have  their  names  on  the  books,  and  seventeen  hundred  are 
working  for  half  wages.  The  curriers  and  leather-dressers  are  in  the  same  situation. 
There  were  never  known  so  many  working  jewellers  out  of  employ,  and  meetings  of  the 
trade  are  now  holding  to  petition  parliament  for  protection  against  the  competition  of 
foreign  labour  " — Morning  Po$t. 


200  THE   HARMONY    OF   INTERESTS. 


CHAPTER  TWENTIETH. 
HOW  PROTECTION  AFFECTS  WOMAN. 

WITH  every  increase  in  the  value  of  labour  and  land,  the  condition  of 
woman  is  improved.  With  every  improvement  in  her  condition,  she  has 
more  leisure  to  devote  to  the  care  of  her  children,  and  to  fitting  them  worthily 
to  fill  their  station  in  society,  giving  value  to  labour  and  land.  If  protection 
be  "a  war  upon  labour  and  capital,"  it  must  tend  to  diminution  in  the 
value  of  labour  and  land,  and  to  deterioration  in  the  condition  of  the  weaker 
sex.  How  far  that  is  the  case  we  may  now  examine. 

Throughout  a  large  portion  of  this  country,  the  time  of  women  is  almost 
entirely  valueless.  They  would  gladly  work  if  they  could,  but  there  is  no 
employment  but  that  on  the  farm,  for  which  they  are  not  fitted.  Place 
in  every  county  of  the  Union  a  mill,  and  there  will  thus  be  produced  a  demand 
for  that  now  surplus  labour,  and  the  workers  in  the  mill  will  obtain  more 
and  better  food  and  clothing,  and  they  will  be  able  to  obtain  more  and  better 
clothing,  and  education,  and  books  by  which  to  improve  their  minds,  and  fit 
them  to  fill  the  station  of  mothers,  to  which  they  will  then  be  called.  For 
want  of  local  employment  the  young  men  are  forced  to  seek  the  cities,  or  to 
fly  to  the  West,  and  thousands  and  tens  of  thousands  of  women  remain  at 
home  unmarried,  while  other  thousands  also  seek  the  cities  in  search  of  em- 
ployment, and  terminate  their  career  as  prostitutes,  because  unable  to  com- 
pete with  the  "  cheap"  labour  of  the  unhappy  subjects  of  the  following  arti- 
cle, which  I  take  from  one  of  the  newspapers  of  the  day : — 

"  The  distressed  needle-women  of  London  have  been  made  the  object  of  a  commission 
of  inquiry  instituted  by  the  Morning  Chronicle.  Three  gentlemen  well  known  in  litera- 
ture Lave  examined  the  state  of  this  unfortunate  class,  and  the  result  is,  that  there  lives  in 
London  a  body  of  about  33,000  women  permanently  at  the  starvation  point ;  working  at 
the  wages  of  a  few  pence  a  day. 

«  The  greater  portion  of  these  poor  creatures,  living,  as  they  do,  far  beyond  the  social 
state,  resort  to  prostitution,  as  a  means  of  eking  out  their  miserable  subsistence ;  whenever 
the  pressure  threatens  their  extinction,  then  they  turn  into  the  street,  and  pauperism  runs 
into  inevitable  vice.  Since  the  disclosures  of  the  Morning  Chronicle,  many  humane 
persons  have  forwarded  considerable  sums  of  money  to  the  office  of  that  journal  for  dis- 
tribution among  the  most  necessitous  objects ;  and  Mr.  Sidney  Herbert  has  come  forward 
to  found  a  society  for  promoting  their  emigration.  There  is  something  like  half  a  million 
of  women  in  excess  of  men  in  Great  Britain  ;  there  is  a  corresponding  excess  of  males  in 
the  British  Australian  Colonies.  The  society  above  mentioned  aims  to  bring  these  mar- 
riageable parties  in  contact;  and  it  is  hoped,  that  when  once  it  is  in  operation,  govern- 
ment will  assist  it  with  funds.  It  costs  some  £15  to  transport  a  passenger  to  Australia. 
Now,  if  private  benevolence  raises  a  sum  of  £30,000,  this  will  only  relieve  2000  of  the 
sufferers :  a  mere  fraction,  whose  absence  would  not  be  sensible  in  the  metropolis.  It 
would  require  ten  times  that  amount  to  lade  out  the  misery  to  the  proper  extent,  and  also 
to  satisfy  the  wants  of  the  colonists." 

"Commerce  is  king,"  and  such  are  his  female  subjects.  To  the  same 
level  must  fall  all  those  who  are  under  the  necessity  of  competing  with  them, 
and  such  are  even  now  the  results  of  the  approach  to  the  system  that  looks  to 
the  maintenance  of  the  English  monopoly  as  being  freedom  of  trade.  The 
compensation  for  female  labour  is  miserably  small,  even  now,  but  it  must  fall 
far  lower  when  we  shall  be  called  upon  to  settle  the  account  for  the  modicum 
of  iron,  wool,  silk,  and  earthenware  that  we  receive  in  exchange  for  all  our 
cotton,  tobacco,  rice,  flour,  pork,  cheese,  butter,  and  evidences  of  debt. 

"  So  God  created  man  in  his  own  image,  in  the  image  of  God  created  he 
him ;  male  and  female  created  he  them.  And  God  blessed  them  and  said 


THE   HARMONY  OF   INTERESTS.  201 

onto  them,  Be  fruitful   and   multiply,   and   replenish  the  earth  and  sub- 
due it." 

Such  was  the  first  command  of  God  to  man  on  earth,  and,  as  he  does  or 
does  not  comply  with  it,  he  is  found  a  moral  or  immoral  being.  If  the  as- 
sociation of  man  with  his  fellow-man  tend  to  the  elevation  of  character  and 
to  the  promotion  of  civilization,  how  infinitely  more  is  such  the  result  of  that 
intimate  association  resulting  from  obedience  to  the  command,  "Be  fruitful 
and  multiply."  The  relation  of  husband  and  wife,  and  that  of  parent  and 
child,  are  both  essential  to  the  development  of  all  that  is  good  and  kind,  gen- 
tle and  thoughtful.  The  desire  to  provide  for  the  wife  and  the  child  prompts 
the  husband  to  labour,  for  the  purpose  of  acquiring  the  means  of  present  sup- 
port, and  to  economy  as  a  means  of  preparation  for  the  future.  The  desire 
to  provide  for  the  husband  and  the  children  prompts  the  wife  to  exertions 
that  would  otherwise  have  been  deemed  impossible,  and  to  sacrifices  that 
none  but  a  wife  or  a  mother  could  make. 

The  modern  school  of  political  economy  says,  "  Be  not  fruitful ;  do  not  mul- 
tiply. Population  tends  to  increase  faster  than  food."  It  prescribes  disobe- 
dience to  the  earliest  of  God's  commands.  Obedience  thereto,  in  those  who 
are  poor,  is  denounced  as  improvidence ;  and  to  those  who  are  so  improvi- 
dent as  to  marry,  "  with  no  provision  for  the  future,  no  sure  and  ample  sup- 
port even  for  the  present,"  it  is  thought  "  important  to  pronounce  distinctly 
that,  on  no  principle  of  social  right  or  justice,  have  they  any  claim  to  share 
the  earnings  or  the  savings  of  their  more  prudent,  more  energetic,  more  self- 
denying  fellow-citizens."*  To  have  a  wife  for  whom  to  labour,  and  with  whom 
to  enjoy  the  fruits  of  labour,  is  a  luxury,  abstinence  from  which  is  placed 
high  among  the  virtues.  To  have  children  to  develope  all  the  kindly  and  pro- 
vident feelings  of  the  parents,  is  a  crime  worthy  of  punishment.  Charity 
is  denounced  as  tending  to  promote  the  growth  of  popuktion.  To  rent  land 
at  less  than  the  full  price,  is  an  error,  because  it  tends  to  increase  the  num- 
ber to  be  fed.  To  clear  the  land  of  thousands  whose  ancestors  have  lived  and 
died  on  the  spot,  is  "  improvement."  Cottage  allotments  are  but  places  for 
breeding  paupers. 

Southey  denounced  the  Byronian  school  of  poetry  as  "  satanic,"  and  so 
may  we  fairly  do  with  the  school  of  political  economy  that  has  grown  out 
of  the  colonial  system,  and  the  desire  to  make  of  England  "  the  work-shop 
of  the  world."  It  teaches  every  thing  but  Christianity,  and  that  any  feel- 
ings of  kindness  towards  those  who  are  so  unfortunate  as  to  be  poor  should 
still  remain  in  England,  is  due  to  the  fact  that  those  who  teach  it  have  not 
in  their  doctrine  sufficient  faith  to  practise  what  they  preach. 

The  direct  tendency  of  the  existing  monopoly  of  machinery  which  it  is 
the  object  of  free  trade  to  maintain,  is  towards  barbarism.  It  drives  hundreds 
of  thousands  of  Englishmen  to  abandon  mothers,  wives,  and  sisters,  and  bar- 
barize themselves  in  the  wilderness,  while  of  those  who  remain  behind  a  large 
portion  are  too  poor  to  marry,  the  consequences  of  which  are  seen  in  the 
immense  extent  of  prostitution  and  the  perpetual  occurrence  of  child  murder. 
In  this  country  it  is  the  same.  Of  the  almost  hundreds  of  thousands  of  men 
who  have  fled  to  the  wilds  of  Oregon  or  California,  a  vast  portion  would  have 
remained  at  home  with  mothers  and  sisters  had  the  consumer  been  allowed 
to  take  his  place  by  the  side  of  the  producer,  as  he  would  long  since  have 
done,  but  for  the  existence  of  this  most  unnatural  system. 

Among  the  women  of  the  world,  there  is  a  perfect  harmony  of  interests. 
It  is  to  the  interest  of  all  that  the  condition  of  all  should  be  elevated,  and 
guch  must  be  the  result  of  an  increase  in  the  value  of  labour.  The  object 

•  Edinburgh  Review,  October,  1849. 


202  THE  HARMONY  OF  INTERESTS. 

of  protection  is  that  of  raising  throughout  the  world  the  value  of  man,  and 
thus  improving  the  condition  of  woman.  Every  woman,  therefore,  who  has 
at  heart  the  elevation  of  her  fellow-women  throughout  the  world,  should 
advocate  the  cause  of  protection. 

CHAPTER  TWENTY-FIRST. 
HOW  PROTECTION   AFFECTS   MORALS. 

THE  moral  man  is  sensible  of  the  duties  he  owes  to  his  wife,  his  children, 
society,  and  himself.  He  frequents  neither  taverns  nor  gaming-houses.  His 
place  is  home. 

The  more  perfect  the  morality  the  more  productive  will  be  the  labour  of  a 
community,  and  the  greater  will  be  the  power  of  its  members  to  improve 
their  moral  and  intellectual  condition.  If  protection  be  "  a  war  upon  labour 
and  capital,"  it  must  tend  to  the  deterioration  of  morality  and  the  diminu- 
tion of  the  reward  of  labour. 

The  more  equal  the  division  of  a  community  between  the  sexes,  the  greater 
will  be  the  power  to  contract  matrimony,  and  the  higher  will  be  morality. 
The  monopoly  system  tends  to  expel  the  men  and  produce  inequality  in  the 
number  of  the  sexes,  and  thus  to  diminish  the  power  to  contract  matrimony, 
thereby  producing  a  tendency  to  immorality.  The  object  of  protection  is  to 
enable  men  to  remain  at  homo,  and  thus  bring  about  equality,  which  cannot 
exist  where  the  tendency  to  dispersion  exists. 

The  more  men  can  remain  at  home,  the  better  they  can  perform  their  du- 
ties to  their  children.  The  monopoly  system  tends  to  compel  them  to  per- 
form their  exchanges  in  distant  markets  and  to  separate  themselves  from 
wives  and  children.  The  object  of  protection  is  to  bring  the  consumer  to 
take  his  place  by  the  side  of  the  producer,  and  enable  them  to  effect  their 
exchanges  at  home. 

The  more  directly  the  consumer  exchanges  with  the  producer,  the  loss  will 
be  the  disposition. and  the  power  to  commit  frauds.  The  farmer  of  Illinois 
has  no  object  in  adulterating  his  corn,  because  corn  is  cheap ;  but  the  miller 
of  England  mixes  beans  with  the  corn,  because  corn  is  dear.  The  planter 
of  Alabama  would  gain  nothing  by  substituting  flour  for  cotton,  because  the 
latter  is  cheap ;  but  the  manufacturer  of  England  does  so  because  cotton  is 
dear.  The  coffee  planter  delivers  coffee.  The  English  shopkeeper  substi- 
tutes chicory  for  coffee,  because  the  latter  is  dear.  The  inducement  to 
fraud  in  these  cases  results  from  the  distance  between  the  producer  and  the 
consumer,  which  it  is  the  object  of  protection  to  diminish.  The  shoemaker 
makes  good  shoes  for  his  customers ;  but  he  makes  indifferent  ones  for  the 
traders  who  deal  with  persons  that  are  distant.  The  gunsmith  furnishes  to 
his  neighbours  guns  that  will  stand  the  proof;  but  when  he  mokes  others  to 
be  sold  in  Africa,  he  cares  little  if  they  burst  at  the  first  fire.  The  necessity 
for  maintaining  the  monopoly  of  machinery  now  enjoyed  by  England  leads 
to  frauds  and  forgeries  of  every  description,  with  a  view  to  displace  the 
foreign  produce  and  deceive  the  foreign  producer.*  The  power  to  commit 

*  As  a  specimen  of  this,  I  take  the  following  from  one  of  the  journals  of  the  day : 
«  We  are  surprised  to  see  ginghams  in  market,  sent  out  from  England  by  the  house  of 
A.  &  S.  Henry  &  Co.  of  Mnnohester,  imitating  the  above  goods  in  patterns,  width,  and 
•tyle  of  finish.  But  a  most  palpable  and  unfair  imitation  is  in  the  label,  where,  preserv- 
ing the  same  general  appearances  as  to  size,  colour  of  paper  and  ornaments,  the  word 
lancattcrian  is  substituted  for  Lancaster.  That  the  whole  is  a  manifest  and  intentional 
Counterfeit,  there  cannot  b«  a  doubt  The  goods  will,  undoubtedly,  be  sold  for  American 
Lancaster  ginghams,  to  which  they  are  inferior  in  firmness  of  fabric  anJ  permanency  of 
Colour,  to  the  manifest  injury  of  the  profits  and  reputation  of  the  Ame.ican  n-pnufacturei 
-  Boston  paper. 


THE   HARMOXY   OF  INTERESTS.  203 

frauds  thus  results  from  the  distance  between  the  consumer  and  the  pro- 
ducer. Protection  looks  to  bringing  them  near  together,  and  thus  dimi- 
nishing that  power. 

The  planter  who  exchanges  on  the  spot  with  the  iron-master  and  the 
miller,  makes  large  crops  and  grows  rich,  and  the  gain  resulting  from  success- 
ful frauds  would  be  trifling  compared  with  the  loss  of  character.  The  one 
who  is  distant  from  both  makes  small  crops,  which  are  sensibly  increased  in 
amount  by  the  substitution  of  stones  in  lieu  of  cotton  or  tobacco.  The 
inducement  to  commit  frauds  here  results  from  the  distance  between  the  con- 
sumer and  the  producer,  and  is  diminished  as  the  loom  and  the  anvil  come 
nearer  to  the  plough  and  the  harrow. 

The  man  who  makes  his  exchanges  in  distant  markets  spends  much  time 
on  the  road  and  in  taverns,  and  is  liable  to  be  led  into  dissipation.  The 
more  he  can  effect  his  exchanges  at  home,  the  less  is  the  danger  of  any  such 
result.  The  object  of  the  monopoly  system  is  that  of  compelling  him  to 
effect  all  his  exchanges  at  a  distance,  and  to  employ  for  that  purpose  nume- 
rous wagoners,  porters,  sailors,  and  other  persons,  most  of  whom  have  scarcely 
any  home  except  the  tavern. 

The  more  uniform  the  standard  of  value,  the  less  does  trade  resemble 
gambling.  The  object  of  the  monopoly  system  is  to  subject  the  produce  of 
the  world  to  a  standard  of  the  most  variable  kind,  and  to  render  agriculture, 
manufactures,  and  trade,  mere  gambling.  The  object  of  protection  is  to 
withdraw  the  produce  of  the  world  from  that  standard,  enabling  every  com- 
munity to  measure  the  products  of  its  labour  by  its  own  standard,  giving 
labour  for  labour. 

The  object  of  the  English  system  is  to  promote  centralization,  and  its 
necessary  consequence  is  that  of  compelling  the  dispersion  of  man  in 
search  of  food.*  London  and  Liverpool,  Manchester  and  Birmingham, 
have  grown  with  vast  rapidity  by  the  same  system  which  has  exhausted 
Ireland,  India,  and  the  West  Indies.  The  same  journal  informs  us  of 
the  construction  of  a  new  town  opposite  Liverpool,  of  the  great  additions 
to  London,  and  of  the  absolute  necessity  for  promoting  emigration  from  Ire- 
land, Scotland,  and  even  from  England.  As  each  successive  province  is 
exhausted,  there  arises  a  desire,  and  even  a  necessity  for  adding  to  the  list. 
Bengal  and  Bombay  having  ceased  to  be  productive,  Affghanistan  is  attempted, 
and  the  Punjaub  is  conquered.  The  ruin  of  the  West  Indies  is  followed  by 
an  invasion  of  China,  for  the  purpose  of  compelling  the  Chinese  to  perfect 
freedom  of  trade.  The  Highlands  are  depopulated,  and  Australia  is  colonized. 

Mr.  Jefferson  held  great  cities  to  be  "great  sores."  He  desired  that  the 
manufacturer  should  take  his  place  by  the  side  of  the  agriculturist — that  the 
loom  and  the  anvil  should  be  in  close  proximity  to  the  plough  and  the  harrow. 
Mr.  Jefferson  looked  and  thought  for  himself.  He  had  studied  political 
economy  before  it  became  necessary  for  Mr.  Malthus  to  invent  a  theory  of 
population  that  should  satisfactorily  account  for  the  scarcity  of  food  under 

*  «  To  those  who  have  never  reflected  on  the  subject,  it  may  seem  like  exaggeration  to 
say  that,  as  a  general  fact,  at  least  nine-tenths  of  the  lower  orders  suffer  physically, 
morally,  and  intellectually,  from  being  over-worked  and  under-fed;  and  yet  I  am  con- 
vinced that  the  more  the  subject  shall  be  investigated,  the  more  deeply  shall  we  become 
impressed  with  the  truth  and  importance  of  the  statement.  It  is  true  that  but  few 
persons  die  from  direct  starvation,  or  the  absolute  want  of  food  for  several  successiva 
days,  but  it  is  not  the  less  certain  that  thousands  upon  thousands  are  annually  cut  off,  whose 
lives  have  been  greatly  shortened  by  excess  of  labour  and  deficiency  of  nourishment 
•  •  It  is  a  rare  thing  for  a  hard-working  artisan  to  arrive  at  a  good  old  age ;  almost  al 
become  prematurely  old,  and  die  long  before  the  natural  term  of  life.'1 — Contbet  Philosophy 
e/Digtitwn. 


204  THE   HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS. 

the  unnatural  policy  of  England,  and  thus  relieve  the  law-makers  of  that 
country  from  all  charge  of  mis-government.  He  studied,  too,  before  Mr. 
Ricardo  had  invented  a  theory  of  rent,  for  the  maintenance  of  which  it  was 
necessary  to  prove  that  the  poor  cultivator,  beginning  the  work  of  settlement, 
always  commenced  upon  the  rich  soils — the  swamps  and  river-bottoms — and 
that  with  the  progress  of  population  he  had  recourse  to  the  poor  soils  of  the 
hills,  yielding  a  constantly  diminishing  return  to  labour — and  therefore  it  was 
that  he  thought  for  himself.  Modern  financiers  have  blindly  adopted  the 
English  system,  based  on  the  theories  of  Malthus  and  Ricardo,  and  the  per- 
fection of  civilization  is  now  held  to  be  found  in  that  system  which  shall 
most  rapidly  build  up  great  cities,  and  most  widely  separate  the  manufacturer 
from  the  agriculturist.  The  more  perfect  the  centralization,  the  greater, 
according  to  them,  will  be  the  tendency  towards  improvement. 

Mr.  Jefferson  was  in  favour  of  combined  action,  as  being  that  which  would 
most  tend  to  promote  human  improvement,  physical,  moral,  intellectual,  and 
political.  That  it  does  so,  would  seem  to  be  obvious,  as  it  is  where  com- 
bination of  action  most  exists  that  men  live  best  and  are  best  instructed — 
commit  least  crimes,  and  think  most  for  themselves.  There,  too,  there  exists 
the  strongest  desire  to  have  protection. 

A  recent  traveller*  in  the  United  States,  says  that  "the  facility  with  which 
every  people  conscientiously  accommodate  their  speculative  opinions  to  their 
local  and  individual  interests,  is  sufficiently  demonstrated  by  the  fact,  that 
the  several  States  and  sections  of  States,  "  as  they  successively  embark  in 
the  manufacture,  whether  of  iron,  cotton,  or  other  articles,  become  imme- 
diately converts  to  protectionist  views,  against  which  they  had  previously 
declaimed." 

It  is  here  supposed  that  the  desire  for  protection  results  from  a  selfish 
desire  to  tax  others,  *but  the  persons  exclusively  devoted  to  manufactures  of 
any  kind  are  too  few  in  number  to  affect  the  elections,  and  yet  wherever  mills 
or  furnaces  are  established,  the  majority  of  the  people  become  advocates  of 
the  doctrine  of  protection,  and  that  majority  mainly  consists  of  agriculturists, 
— farmers  and  planters.  Why  it  is  so,  may  be  found  in  the  fact  that  they  ex- 
perience the  benefits  resulting  from  making  a  market  on  the  land  for  the 
products  of  the  land,  and  desire  that  their  neighbours  may  do  the  same. 
Ignorant  selfishness  would  induce  them  to  desire  to  retain  for  themselves  the 
advantage  they  had  gained.  Enlightened  selfishness  would  induce  them  to 
teach  others  that  which  they  themselves  had  learned. 

Ignorant  selfishness  is  the  characteristic  of  the  savage.  It  disappears  as 
men  acquire  the  habit  of  association  with  their  neighbour  men.  The  pro- 
claimed object  of  the  monopoly  system  is  that  of  producing  a  necessity  for 
scattering  ourselves  over  large  surfaces,  and  thus  increasing  the  difficulty  of 
association,  and  the  object  is  attained.  "  The  prospect  of  heaven  itself,"  says 
Cooper,  in  one  of  his  novels,  "  would  have  no  charm  for  an  American  of  the 
backwoods,  if  he  thought  there  was  any  place  further  west." 

Such  is  the  common  impression.  It  is  believed  that  men  separate  from 
each  other  because  of  something  in  their  composition  that  tends  to  produce  a 
desire  for  flying  to  wild  lands,  there  probably  to  perish  of  fever,  brought  on 
by  exposure,  and  certainly  to  leave  behind  them  all  that  tends  to  make  life 
desirable.  Such  is  not  the  character  of  man  anywhere.  He  is  everywhere 
disposed  tp  remain  at  home,  when  he  can,  and  if  the  farmers  and  planters  of 
the  Union  can  be  brought  to  understand  their  true  interests,  at  home  he  will 
remain,  and  doing  so,  his  condition  and  that  of  all  around  him,  will  be  im- 

•  Sir  Charles  Lyell 


THE   HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS.  205 


proved.  The  habit  of  association  is  necessary  to  the  improvement  of  man. 
With  it  comes  the  love  of  the  good  and  the  beautiful.  "  I  wish,"  says  the 
author  of  a  recent  agricultural  address,  "  that  we  could  create  a  general 
passion  for  gardening  and  horticulture.  We  want,"  he  continues,  "  more 
beauty  about  our  houses.  The  scenes  of  childhood  are  the  memories  of  our 
future  years.  Let  our  dwellings  be  beautified  with  plants  and  flowers.  Flow- 
ers are,  in  the  language  of  a  late  cultivator,  '  the  playthings  of  childhood  and 
the  ornaments  of  the  grave ;  they  raise  smiling  looks  to  man  and  grateful 
ones  to  God.'  " 

We  do  want  more  beauty  about  our  houses,  and  not  only  about  our  houses 
but  about  our  minds,  and  that  it  may  be  obtained,  we  must  rid  ourselves  of 
a  system  which  makes  the  producer  the  servant  of  the  exchanger.  Such  is 
the  object  of  protection. 

It  is  most  truly  said  that  "there  is  no  friendship  in  trade."  As  now  carried 
on,  it  certainly  does  not  tend  to  promote  kindly  feelings  among  the  human 
race,  nor  can  it  do  so  while  the  system  remains  unchanged.  The  great 
object  of  traders  appears  to  be  the  production  of  discord.  By  so  doing, 
England  has  obtained  the  supreme  control  of  India,  per  journals  are  un- 
ceasingly engaged  in  sowing  discord  among  the  various  portions  of  this  Union, 
and  the  effort  would  be  successful  were  it  not  that  there  is  no  real  dis- 
cordance in  their  true  interests. 

Tt  is  time  that  the  people  of  Great  Britain  should  open  their  eyes  to  the 
fact  that  their  progress  is  in  the  same  direction  in  which  have  gone  the  com- 
munities of  Athens,  and  Rome,  and  every  other  that  has  desired  to  support 
itself  by  the  labour  of  others.  It  is  time  that  they  should  awake  to  the  fact 
that  the  numerous  and  splendid  gin-shops,  the  perpetual  recurrence  of  child- 
murder  for  the  purpose  of  plundering  burial  societies,  and  the  enormous  in- 
crease of  cHme*  and  pauperism,  are  but  the  natural  consequence  of  a  system 
that  tends  to  drive  capital  from  the  land,  to  be  employed  in  spindles  and 

*  "  Humanity  cries  to  us  from  the  depths.  If  we  will  not  answer  her,  it  were  better  a 
millstone  were  tied  about  our  necks,  and  that  we  were  cast  into  the  sea.  Have  we  no 
sense  of  the  precipice  on  which  we  stand  ?  Have  not  the  books  of  the  prophetess  been 
one  by  one  burnt  before  our  eyes — and  does  not  the  sybil  even  now  knock  at  our  doors  to 
offer  us  her  final  volume,  ere  she  turn  from  us  and  leave  us  to  the  Furies  ?  Crime,  not 
stealing,  but  striding  onward.  Murders,  poisonings,  becoming  almost  a  domestic  institu- 
tion among  our  villages — husband,  children,  parents,  drugged  to  their  final  home  for  the 
sake  of  the  burial  fees.  Vice  within  the  law,  keeping  pace  with  offence  without.  Incest 
winked  at  by  our  magistracy  from  its  fearful  frequency  in  our  squalid  peasant  dwellings. 
Taxation  reaching  beyond  the  point  at  which  resources  can  meet  it,  so  that,  at  increasingly 
shorter  intervals,  we  have  to  borrow  from  ourselves  to  make  expenditure  square  with 
income.  Poor  Laws  extended  to  Scotland  and  Ireland,  where  they  were  never  known 
before,  and  new  Poor  Laws  failing  in  England  to  check  the  advance  of  rates,  and  the 
growth  of  inveterate  beggary,  until  property  threatens  to  be  swallowed  up  by  the  pro- 
pertyless,  and  a  terrible  communism  to  be  realized  among  us  by  a  legalized  division  of 
the  giwds  of  those  who  have,  among  those  who  have  not — the  fearfullest  socialism,  the 
equal  republic  of  beggary.  'Speak!  strike!  redress!'  Three  millions  and  a  half  of  the 
houseless  and  homeless,  the  desperate,  the  broken,  the  lost,  plead  to  you  in  a  small  stUl 
voice,  yet  louder  than  the  mouthing  theories  of  constitution-mongers.  Man,  abused,  in 
suited,  degraded,  shows  to  you  his  social  scars,  his  broken  members,  his  maimed  carcass, 
blurred  In  the  conflict  of  a  selfish  and  abused  community. 

"  We  say  it  must  no  longer  be.  We  are  a  spectacle  to  gods  and  men — '  a  by-word  and 
a  hissing  to  the  nations.'  Savages  grow  up  in  the  midst  of  our  feather-head  civilization, 
wilder,  more  forlorn,  more  forgotten,  and  neglected  than  the  Camanches,  or  the  earth- 
eaters  of  New  Holland.  Ragged  foundlings,  deserted  infant  wretchedness,  paupers  here- 
ditary, boasting  a  beggar  pedigree  older  than  many  of  our  nobles,  grow  up  from  y<?ar 
to  year,  generation  to  generation,  eat  with  brazen  front  into  the  substance  of  struggling 
industry.1' — The  Mother  Country,  by  Sydney  Smith. 


206  THE   HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS. 

ships,  and  labour  from  the  healthful  and  inspiring  pursuits  of  the  country,  to 
seek  employment  in  Liverpool  and  Manchester,  where  severe  labour  in  the 
effort  to  underwork  the  poor  Hindoo,  and  drive  him  from  his  loom,  is  re- 
warded with  just  sufficient  to  keep  the  labourer  from  starving  in  the  lanes 
and  cellars  with  which  those  cities  so  much  abound. 

That  "there  is  no  friendship  in  trade,"  is  most  true,  and  yet  trade  is. the 
deity  worshipped  in  this  school.  In  it  "  commerce  is  king,"  and  yet  to  com- 
merce we  owe  much  of  the  existing  demoralization  of  the  world.  The  anx- 
iety to  sell  cheap  induces  the  manufacturer  to  substitute  cotton  for  silk,  and 
flour  for  cotton,  and  leads  to  frauds  and  adulterations  of  every  description. 
Bankruptcy  and  loss  of  honour  follow  in  the  train  of  its  perpetual  revulsions. 
To  obtain  intelligence  an  hour  beforehand  of  an  approaching  famine,  and 
thus  to  be  enabled  to  buy  corn  at  less  than  it  is  worth,  or  to  hear  in  advance 
of  the  prospect  of  good  harvests,  and  to  sell  it  at  more  than  it  is  worth,  is 
but  an  evidence  of  superior  sagacity.  To  buy  your  coat  in  the  cheapest 
market,  careless  what  are  the  sufferings  of  the  poor  tailor,  and  sell  your 
grain  in  the  dearest,  though  your  neighbour  may  be  starving,  is  the  cardinal 
principle  of  this  school. 

A  very  slight  examination  will  suffice  to  convince  the  reader  that,  as  has 
been  already  shown,  these  frauds  and  overreachings  increase  in  the  ratio  of 
the  distance  between  the  consumer  and  the  producer.  The  food  that  has 
travelled  far  is  dear,  and  worthy  to  be  mixed  with  beans.  The  cotton  pro- 
duced in  remote  lands  is  dear,  and  it  is  profitable  to  mix  it  with  flour.  The 
shoemaker  who  supplies  the  auctions  uses  poor  leather,  and  employs 
poor  workmen.*  The  object  of  protection  is  that  of  bringing  the  consumer 
of  food  to  the  side  of  its  producer,  there  to  eat  plenty  of  good  and  nourish- 
ing food  j  the  consumer  of  cotton  to  the  side  of  its  producer  that  he  may  not 
need  to  wear  a  mixture  of  wool  and  paste ;  and  the  shoemaker  to  the  side  of 
the  farmer  and  planter,  that  the  latter  may  be  supplied  with  "  custom-work," 
and  not  "  slop-work."  By  this  he  gains  doubly.  He  gives  less  food,  and 
gets  better  clothing  in  return.  By  so  doing,  his  own  physical  condition  and 
the  moral  condition  of  the  shoemaker  are  both  improved. 

The  whole  tendency  of  the  system  is  to  the  production  of  a  gambling 
spirit.  In  England,  it  makes  railroad  kings,  ending  in  railroad  bankrupts, 
like  Henry  Hudson.  If  we  could  trace  the  effect  of  the  great  speculation 
of  which  this  man  was  the  father,  we  should  find  thousands  and  tens  of  thou- 
sands of  husbands  and  wives,  parents  and  children,  utterly  beggared  to  build 
up  the  fortunes  of  the  few,  and  thus  increase  the  inequality  of  social  condi- 
tion which  lies  at  the  root  of  all  evil.  If  we  examine  it  here,  we  see  it  send- 
ing tens  of  thousands  to  California,  eager  for  gold,  there  to  lose  both  health 
and  life.f  It  is  sending  thousands  of  boys  and  girls  to  our  cities — the  former 

•  Take,  as  an  illustration  in  the  system,  the  fraud  in  carpets,  such  as  are  usually  sold 
at  auction.  «  The  head  end  of  the  piece  is  woven  firmly  for  a  few  yards,  when  the  web 
is  gradually  slackened,  so  that  the  inside  of  the  piece  bears  no  comparison  with  the  out- 
side. This  is  done  so  adroitly  that  it  is  impossible  for  any,  but  the  best  judges  to  tell  in 
what  the  cheat  consists.  There  is  a  double  evil  in  this  imposture,  for  the  fabric  not  only 
grows  poorer  and  thinner  as  the  piece  is  unrolled,  but  the  figures,  containing  of  course 
the  same  number  of  threads  throughout,  will  not  match,  their  size  being  increased  with 
the  slackness  in  weaving.  This  is  not  only  a  positive  cheat,  but  it  greatly  interferes  with 
the  honest  dealer,  whose  goods  being  alike  throughout,  cannot  of  course  compete  in  price. 
It  is  incredible  to  what  an  extent  this  practice  is  carried,  and  it  is  high  time  there  was 
some  legal  remedy.1' — Dry  Good*  Reporter. 

f  "This  is  one  of  the  strangest  places  in  Christendom.  I  know  many  men,  who  wer* 
models  of  piety,  morality,  and  all  that  sort  of  thing,  when  they  first  arrived  hero,  and 

VOL.  Ill-- 19 


THE   HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS.  207 

to  become  shopmen,  and  the  latter  prostitutes,  while  hundreds  of  thousands 
are  at  the  same  time  making  their  way  to  the  West,  there  to  begin  the  work 
of  cultivation,  while  millions  upon  millions  of  acres  in  the  old  States  remain 
untouched.  With  every  step  of  our  progress  in  that  direction,  social  ine- 
quality tends  to  increase.  The  skilful  speculator  realizes  a  fortune  by  the 
same  operation  that  ruins  hundreds  around  him,  and  adds  to  his  fortune  by 
buying  their  property  under  the  hammer  of  the  sheriff.  The  wealthy  manu- 
facturer is  unmoved  by  revulsions  in  the  British  market  which  sweep  away 
his  competitors,  and,  when  the  storm  blows  over,  he  is  enabled  to  double, 
treble,  or  quadruple,  his  already  overgrown  fortune.  The  consequence  is,  that 
great  manufacturing  towns  spring  up  in  one  quarter  of  the  Union,  while  al- 
most every  effort  to  localize  manufactures  (thus  bringing  the  loom  and  the 
anvil  really  to  the  side  of  the  plough  and  the  harrow)  is  followed  by  ruin. 
The  system  tends  to  make  the  rich  richer  and  the  poor  poorer.  The  coal 
miner  of  the  present  year  works  for  half  wages,  but  the  coal  speculator  ob- 
tains double  profits,  and  thus  is  it  ever — the  producer  is  sacrificed  to  the  ex- 
changer. With  the  growth  of  the  exchanging  class,  great  cities  rise  up,  filled 
with  shops,  at  which  men  can  cheaply  become  intoxicated.  New  York  has 
4567  places  at  which  liquor  is  sold,  and  the  Five- Points  are  peopled  with  the 
men  who  make  Astor-place  riots.  Single  merchants  employ  160  clerks, 
while  thousands  of  those  who  are  forced  into  our  cities  and  seek  to  obtain 
a  living  by  trade  are  ruined.  Opera  singers  receive  large  salaries  paid  by 
the  contributions  of  men  whose  shirts  are  made  by  women  whose  wages 
scarcely  enable  them  to  live. 

The  whole  system  of  trade,  as  at  present  conducted,  and  as  it  must  con- 
tinue to  be  conducted  if  the  colonial  system  be  permitted  longer  to  exist,  is 
one  of  mere  gambling,  and  of  all  qualities,  that  which  most  distinguishes 
the  gambler  is  ignorant  selfishness.  He  ruins  his  friends  and  wastes  his  win- 
nings on  a  running-horse,  or  on  a  prostitute.  To  what  extent  this  has  been 
the  characteristic  of  the  men  who  have  figured  most  largely  in  the  walks  of 
commerce,  might  be  determined  by  those  who  are  familiar  with  the  concerns 
of  many  of  the  persons  described  in  the  following  passage,  which  I  take  from 
one  of  the  journals  of  the  day : 

"  The  great  merchants  of  this  great  mercantile  city,  who  were  looked  up  to  with  reve- 
rence by  the  mammon-worshipping  crowd  twenty  years  ago — where  are  they  ?  Ask  Ste- 
phen Whitney  and  those  few  who  have  with  him  survived  the  shock  of  thirty  years' 
changes,  and  they  will  tell  you,  in  commercial  language,  that  93  or  95  per  cent,  of  their  con- 
temporaries at  that  date  have  since  become  bankrupt,  and  that  the  widows  of  most  of  thosv 
deceased  are  either  '•  keeping  boarding-houses"  or  have  left  friendless  orphans  to  "the  ten 
der  mercies"  of  a  commercial  world. 

«  Look  at  the  ephemeral  creatures  of  this  and  last  year's  accidents,  who  now  figure  largelj 
in  the  great  world  of  New  York,  whether  in  the  wholesale  or  retail  line — whether  ir 
commerce,  fashion,  theatricals  or  religion — and  ask  where  and  what  they  or  their  childrer 
are  likely  to  be  twenty-years  hence.  The  answer  will  be  such  as  none  of  those  mos1 
deeply  in  it  will  be  apt  to  give  with  precise  or  probable  correctness.  '  They  shall  heap  up 
riches  and  know  not  who  shall  gather  them ;'  '  they  shall  build  houses  and  know  not  who 
sLall  inhabit  them;'  'they  shall  plant  vineyards  and  shall  not  eat  the  fruit  of  them;" 
they  shall  'call  their  lands  after  their  own  names,'  and  a  generation  shall  rise  up  and 
possess  them  who  shall  laugh  those  names  into  a  contempt  from  which  the  oblivion  that 
shall  succeed  will  seem  a  happy  deliverance." — N.  Y.  Herald, 

who  are  now  most  desperate  gamblers  and  drunkards." — Extract  from  a  letter  dated  &M 
Franciico,  July  30. 

"  American  Lottery — Class  No.  1 — $10,000  in  actual  prizes,  sixty-six  numbers,  twelva 
drawn  ballots.  Whole  tickets,  $10 ;  half  do.  $5.  This  lottery  will  be  drawn  at  the 
Public  Institute  in  San  Francisco,  on  the  third  day  of  October,  :49,  at  twelve  o'clock,  M , 
under  the  superintendence  of  the  managers." — Pacific  Newt. 


208  THE   HARMONY   OF  INTERESTS. 

As  a  necessary  consequence  of  the  system,  money  becomes  more  and  more 
an  object  of  consideration  in  the  contraction  of  the  important  engagement 
of  matrimony,  and  marriage  settlements  begin  to  appear  among  us.  The 
newspapers  of  the  day  inform  us  of  the  recent  execution  of  one  for  8200,000. 

If  we  look  westward,  it  is  the  same.  Centralization  produces  depopula- 
tion, and  that  is  followed  by  poverty  and  crime.  London  grows  upon  the 
system  that  ruins  India  and  fills  it  with  bands  of  plunderers.  The  West  and 
South-west  are  filled  with  gamblers,  and  land-pirates  abound.  The  late  war 
has  brought  into  existence  a  new  species  of  fraud,  in  the  counterfeiting  of 
land-warrants,  and  this  is  but  one  of  the  many  evils  resulting  from  that 
measure. 

If  we  look  back  but  a  few  years,  we  may  see  that  the  period  between 
1835  and  1843  was  remarkable  for  the  existence  of  crime,  and  it  was  that 
one  in  which  the  tendency  to  dispersion  most  existed.  If  we  now  look  to  the 
period  between  1843  and  1847,  we  can  see  that  there  was  a  gradual  tendency 
to  the  restoration  of  order  and  quiet  and  morality  throughout  the  Union. 
In  the  last  year,  we  may  see  the  reverse.  It  was  marked  by  turnouts,  insub- 
ordination and  violence  of  various  kinds  in  country  and  in  city.  Such 
is  the  direct  consequence  of  a  diminution  in  the  productiveness  of  labour. 
The  employer  must  pay  less,  and  the  employed  is  unwilling  to  receive  less 
than  that  to  which  he  has  been  accustomed. 

The  tendency  of  the  colonial  system  is  to  increase  the  number  of  wagons 
and  wagoners,  ships  and  sailors,  merchants  and  traders,  the  men  who  neces- 
sarily spend  much  time  in  hotels  and  taverns,  living  by  exchanging  the  pro- 
ducts of  others.  The  tendency  of  protection  is  to  increase  the  number  of  pro- 
ducers— of  the  class  that  lives  at  home,  surrounded  by  wives,  children,  and 
friends.  The  one  builds  up  the  city  at  the  expense  of  the  country  j  the 
other  causes  both  to  grow  together. 

Cities  are  rivals  for  trade,  and  when  the  farmer  desires  a  new  road  to  mar- 
ket he  is  opposed,  lest  it  should  enable  him  to  go  more  cheaply  to  Charles- 
ton than  Savannah;  to  New  York  more  readily  than  to  Philadelphia.  London 
is  jealous  of  Liverpool,  and  Liverpool  of  London.  Discord  is  everywhere, 
and  the  smaller  the  amount  of  production,  the  greater  must  it  necessarily  be. 
Protection  seeks  to  increase  production,  and  thus  establish  harmony. 

It  is  asserted  that  protection  tends  to  increase  smuggling,  and  therefore  to 
deteriorate  morals.  To  'determine  this  question,  it  would  be  required  only  to 
ascertain  what  description  of  men  transact  business  at  our  custom-houses. 
From  1830  to  1834,  the  chief  part  was  done  by  men  who  had  homes  occu- 
pied by  wives  and  families,  for  whose  sake  reputation  was  dear,  but  from  1835 
to  1842,  it  passed  almost  entirely  into  the  hands  of  men  who  lived  in  hotels 
and  boarding-houses,  and  who  had  neither  wives  nor  families  to  maintain. 
From  1843  to  1847,  it  went  back  to  the  former  class.  It  has  now  returned  al- 
most entirely  into  the  hands  of  agents — men  whose  business  is  trade,  and  who 
swear  to  a  false  invoice  for  a  commission.  The  honest  man,  who  desires  to 
perform  his  duties  to  his  wife  and  children,  to  society,  to  his  country,  and  to 
Lis  Creator,  cannot  import  foreign  merchandise.  The  system  is  a  premium 
on  immorality  and  fraud. 

The  object  of  protection  is  the  establishment  of  perfect  free  trade,  by  the 
annexation  of  men  and  of  nations.  Every  man  brought  here  increases  the 
domain  of  free  trade,  and  diminishes  the  necessity  for  custom-houses.  Every 
man  brought  here  consumes  four,  six,  ten,  or  twelve  pounds  of  cotton  for  one 
that  he  could  consume  at  home,  and  every  one  is  a  customer  to  the  farmer 
for  bushels  instead  of  gills.  Between  the  honest  and  intelligent  man  who 
desires  to  see  the  establishment  of  real  free-trade,  the  Christian  who  desires  to  see 
an  improvement  in  the  standard  of  morality,  the  planter  who  desires  an  in- 


THE   HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS.  209 

creased  market  for  his  cotton,  the  farmer  who  desires  larger  returns  to  his 
labour,  the  landowner  who  desires  to  see,  an  increase  in  the  value  of  his 
land,  and  the  labourer  who  desires  to  sell  his  labour  at  the  highest  price, 
there  is  perfect  harmony  of  interest. 

CHAPTER  TWENTY-SECOND. 
HOW   PROTECTION   AFFECTS   INTELLECTUAL   CONDITION. 

THE  higher  the  degree  of  intellect  applied  to  the  work  of  production,  the 
larger  will  be  the  return  to  labour,  and  the  more  rapid  will  be  the  accumu- 
lation of  capital.  If  protection  be  "  a  war  upon  labour  and  capital/'  it  must 
tend  to  prevent  the  growth  of  intellect. 

The  more  men  are  enabled  to  combine  their  efforts,  and  the  greater  the 
tendency  to  association,  the  larger  is  the  return  to  labour,  and  the  more 
readily  can  they  obtain  books  and  newspapers  for  themselves,  and  schools  for 
their  children.  The  object  of  the  monopoly  system  is  that  of  compelling 
men  to  scatter  themselves  over  large  surfaces,  and  into  distant  colonies,  and 
thus  to  diminish  the  power  of  obtaining  books,  newspapers  and  schools. 
The  object  of  protection  is  the  correction  of  this  error,  and  to  enable  men  to 
combine  their  efforts  for  mental  as  well  as  physical  improvement. 

The  greater  the  tendency  to  association,  the  greater  is  the  facility  for  the 
dissemination  of  new  ideas  in  regard  to  modes  of  thought  or  action,  and  for 
obtaining  aid  in  carrying  them  into  practical  effect.  The  object  of  the  English 
monopoly  system  is  that  of  separating  men  from  each  other,  and  depriving 
them  of  this  advantage.  The  object  of  protection  is  to  enable  them  to  come 
together,  and. being  so,  it  would  seem  to  be  the  real  friend  to  both  labourer 
and  capitalist. 

If  we  look  throughout  the  world  we  shall  see  intellect  increasing  as  men 
live  more  and  more  in  communion  with  each  other,  and  diminishing  as  they 
are  compelled  to  separate.  The  man  who  is  distant  from  market  spends 
much  of  his  time  in  taverns,  where  he  obtains  little  tending  to  the  improve- 
ment of  mind  or  morals.  The  man  who  has  a  market  at  his  door,  may  obtain 
books  and  newspapers,  and  he  is  surrounded  by  skilful  farmers,  from  whom 
he  obtains  information.  Not  being  compelled  to  spend  his  time  on  the  road, 
he  is  enabled  to  give  both  time  and  mind  to  the  improvement  of  his  land,  to 
which  he  returns  the  refuse  in  the  form  of  manure,  and  thus  it  is  that  he 
himself  grows  rich. 

Of  all  the  pursuits  of  man,  agriculture — the  work  of  production — is  the 
one  that  most  tends  to  the  expansion  of  intellect.  It  is  the  great  pursuit  of 
man.  There  is  none  "  in  which  so  many  of  the  laws  of  nature  must  be  con- 
sulted and  understood  as  in  the  cultivation  of  the  earth.  Every  change  of 
the  season,  every  change  even  of  the  winds,  every  fall  of  rain,  must  affect 
some  of  the  manifold  operations  of  the  farmer.  In  the  improvement  of  our 
various  domestic  animals,  some  of  the  most  abstruse  principles  of  physiology 
must  be  consulted.  Is  it  to  be  supposed  that  men  thus  called  upon  to  study, 
or  to  observe  the  laws  of  nature,  and  labour  in  conjunction  with  its  powers, 
require  less  of  the  light  of  the  highest  science  than  the  merchant  or  the 
manufacturer?"*  It  is  not.  It  is  the  science  that  requires  the  greatest 
knowledge,  and  the  one  that  pays  lest  for  it :  and  yet  England  has  driven 
man,  and  wealth,  and  mind,  into  the  less  profitable  pursuits  of  fashioning 
and  exchanging  the  products  of  other  lands  :  and  has  expended  thousands  of 
millions  on  fleets  and  armies  to  enable  her  to  drive  with  foreign  nations  the 
poor  trade,  when  her  own  soil  offered  her  the  richer  one  that  tends  to  produce 

*  Wadsworth's  Address  to  the  New  York  Agricultural  Society 


210  THE  HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS. 

that  increase  of  wealth  and  concentration  of  population  which  have  in  all 
times  and  in  all  ages  given  the  self-protective  power  that  requires  neither 
fleets,  nor  armies,  nor  tax-gatherers.  In  her  efforts  to  force  this  trade,  she 
has  driven  the  people  of  the  United  States  to  extend  themselves  over  vast 
tracts  of  inferior  land  when  they  might  more  advantageously  have  concen- 
trated themselves  on  rich  ones :  and  she  has  thus  delayed  the  progress  of 
civilization  abroad  and  at  home.  She  has  made  it  necessary  for  the  people 
of  grain-growing  countries  to  rejoice  in  the  deficiencies  of  her  harvests,  as 
affording  them  the  outlet  for  surplus  food  that  they  could  not  consume,  and 
that  was  sometimes  abandoned  on  the  field  as  not  worth  the  cost  of  har- 
vesting; instead  of  being  enabled  to  rejoice  in  the  knowledge  that  others 
were  likely  to  be  fed  as  abundantly  as  themselves.  Her  internal  system  was 
unsound,  and  her  wealth  gave  her  power  to  make  that  unsoundness  a  cause 
of  disturbance  to  the  world  ;  and  hence  she  has  appeared  to  be  everywhere 
regarded  as  a  sort  of  common  enemy. 

To  this  unsound  system  we  are  indebted  for  the  very  unsound  ideas  that 
exist  in  regard  to  the  division  of  labour.  Men  are  crowded  into  large  towns 
and  cities,  to  labour  in  great  shops,  where  the  only  idea  ever  acquired  is  the 
pointing  of  a  needle,  and  that  is  acquired  at  the  cost  of  health  and  life.  The 
necessary  consequence  is  the  general  inferiority  of  physical,  moral,  and 
mental  condition,  that  is  observable  in  all  classes  of  English  workmen. 

Of  all  machines,  the  most  costly  to  produce  is  Man,  and  yet  the  duration 
of  this  expensive  and  beautiful  machine  is  reduced  to  an  average  of  twenty- 
five  or  thirty  years;  under  the  vain  idea  that  by  so  doing  pins  and  needles 
may  be  obtained  at  less  cost  of  labour.  The  principle  is  the  same  that  is 
said  to  govern  the  planter  of  Cuba  when  he  stocks  his  estate  exclusively  with 
males,  deeming  it  cheaper  to  buy  slaves  than  to  raise  them.  As  a  necessary 
consequence;  the  duration  of  life  is  there  short,  and  so  is  it  in  the  crowded  facto- 
ries of  the  great  "  workshop  of  the  world."  The  idea  is  vain.  Pins  and 
needles  would  be  obtained  at  far  less  cost  of  labour  were  the  workshops  of 
Sheffield  and  of  Birmingham  scattered  throughout  the  kingdom,  thereby 
enabling  the  producers  of  pins  to  take  their  places  by  the  side  of  the  producers 
of  food,  and  enabling  all  to  enjoy  the  pure  air  and  pure  water  of  the  village, 
instead  of  being  compelled,  after  breathing  the  foul  atmosphere  of  the  work- 
shop during  the  day,  to  retire  at  night  to  rest  in  the  filthy  cellar  of  the  un- 
drained  street.  Were  the  ore  of  Ireland  converted  into  axes  and  railroad 
bars  by  aid  of  the  coal  and  the  labour  of  Ireland,  the  cellars  of  Manchester 
and  Birmingham  would  not  be  filled  with  starving  Irishmen,  flying  by  hun- 
dreds of  thousands  from  pestilence  and  famine,  and  compelling  the  labourers 
of  England  to  fly  to  the  United  States,  Canada,  or  Australia. 

The  English  school  of  political  economy  treats  man  as  a  mere  machine, 
placed  on  the  earth  for  the  purpose  of  producing  food,  cloth,  iron,  pins,  or 
needles,  and  takes  no  account  of  him  as  a  being  capable  of  intellectual  and 
moral  improvement.  It  looks  for  physical  power  in  connection  with  igno- 
rance £tnd  immorality,  and  the  result  is  disappointment.*  The  workman  of 

•  The  commissioners  for  inquiring  into  the  state  of  education  in  Wales,  describe  a  state 
of  mental  condition  perfectly  in  keeping  with  the  following  account  of  their  physical  con- 
dition : — "The  houses  and  cottages  of  the  people  are  wretchedly  bad,  and  akin  to  Irish 
hovels.  Brick  chimneys  are  very  unusual  in  these  cottages ;  those  which  exist  are  usually 
in  the  shape  of  large  coves,  the  top  being  of  basket-work.  In  few  cottages  is  there  more 
than  one  room,  which  serves  for  the  purpose  of  living  and  sleeping."  Hence  it  is  that 
there  is  so  universal  a  want  of  chastity,  resulting,  say  the  commissioners,  "  from  the  re- 
volting habit  of  herding  married  and  unmarried  people  of  both  sexes,  often  unconnected 
by  relationship,  in  the  same  sleeping  rooms,  and  often  in  adjoining  beds,  without  partition 
or  curtain."  [See  Westminster  Review,  2fo  ^ 


THE   HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS.  211 

this  country  is  infinitely  the  superior  of  the  workman  of  Manchester,  aud  the 
reason  is,  that  he  is  not  treated  as  a  mere  machine.  The  object  of  what 
is  called  free  trade  is  to  degrade  the  one  to  the  level  of  the  other.  The  object 
of  protection  is  that  of  enabling  the  poor  artisan  of  Manchester  or  Leeds, 
Birmingham  or  Sheffield,  to  transfer  himself  to  a  country  in  which  he  will 
not  be  so  treated,  and  in  which  he  may  have  books  and  newspapers,  and  his 
children  may  be  educated. 

The  colonial  system  involves  an  expenditure  for  ships  of  war,  soldiers,  and 
sailors,  greater  than  would  be  required  for  giving  to  every  child  in  the  king- 
dom an  education  of  the  highest  order;  and  those  ships  and  men  are  sup- 
ported out  of  the  proceeds  of  taxes  paid  by  poor  mechanics  and  agricultural 
labourers,  whose  children  grow  up  destitute  even  of  the  knowledge  that 
there  is  a  God.  The  object  of  protection  is  to  do  away  with  the  necessity 
for  such  ships  and  men,  and  to  raise  the  value  of  labour  to  such  a  point  as 
will  enable  the  people  of  England  to  provide  schools  for  themselves. 

In  the  colonies,  the  perpetual  exhaustion  of  the  land  and  its  owner  has  for- 
bidden, as  it  now  forbids,  the  idea  of  intellectual  improvement.  To  the  West 
Indies  no  Englishmen  went  to  remain.  The  plantations  were  managed  by 
agents,  and  the  poor  blacks,  under  their  agency,  died  so  fast  as  to  ven- 
der necessary  an  annual  importation  merely  to  keep  up  the  number.  In 
India,  where  education  was  from  the  earliest  period  an  object  of  interest 
to  the  government,  and  where  every  well-regulated  village  had  its  public 
school  and  its  schoolmaster,  in  which  information  was  so  well  and  so 
cheaply  taught  as  to  furnish  the  idea  of  the  Lancaster  system,  it  has  almost 
disappeared.  In  the  thana  of  Nattore,  containing  184,509  inhabitants,  there 
were,  a  few  years  since,  but  27  schools,  with  262  scholars.  The  teachers 
were  simple-minded  and  ignorant,  with  salaries  of  $2-50  per  month,  and  the 
scholars  were  without  books.  The  number  who  could  read  and  write  was 
6000.  Such  was  the  state  of  education  in  one  of  the  best  portions  of 
Bengal.  In  the  Bombay  presidency,  with  a  population  of  six  and  a  half 
millions,  there  were  25  government  schools,  with  1315  scholars,  and  1680 
village  schools,  with  33,838  scholars.  In  the  Madras  presidency,  out  of  13 
millions,  there  were  355,000  male  and  8000  female  scholars,  and  the  in- 
struction was  of  the  worst  kind. 

In  Upper  Canada,  in  1848,  the  number  of  children,  male  and  female, 
under  fourteen  years  of  age,  was  326,050,  of  whom  but  80,461  attended 
school.*  So  far  the  state  of  things  is  better  than  in  other  colonies ;  but  when 
we  come  to  look  further,  the  difference  is  not  very  great.  The  intellect  of  man 
is  to  be  quickened  by  communion  with  his  fellow-man,  of  which  there  can 
be  but  little  where  the  loom  is  widely  distant  from  the  plough,  and  men  are 
distant  from  each  other,  all  engaged  in  the  single  pursuit  of  agriculture. 
How  slow  has  bee»-  the  growth  of  concentration  in  that  province,  may  be 
seen  from  the  following  facts.  Numerous  small  woollen  mills  furnish  584,008 
yards  of  flannel  and  other  inferior  cloths,  working  up  the  produce  of  perhaps 
250,000  sheep.  Fulling  mills  exist,  at  which  about  2,000,000  pounds  of 
woollen  cloths  of  household  manufacture  are  fulled.  Further,  there  are — 
1  rope-walk.  11  pail  factories.  1  ship-yard.  1  vinegar  factory. 

1  candle  factory.  1  last  factory.  1  trip  hammer.  5  chair  factories. 

1  cement  mill.  4  oil  mills.  2  paper  mills, making  2  brick-yards. 

1  sal-eratus  factory.      3  tobacco  factories.  1900  reams  each.     1  axe  factory,  produc- 

8  soap  factories.  2  steam-engine  facto-  3  potteries,  ing  5000  per  annum. 

3  nail  factories.  ries.  1  comb  factory.  6  plaster  mills,  f 

And  these  constitute  the  whole  of  the  manufacturing  establishments  of 
•  Appendix  to  first  Report  of  Board  of  Registration,  f  Ibid. 


212  THE   HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS. 

that  great  district  of  country,  much  of  it  so  long  settled.  There  is,  conse- 
quently, little  or  no  employment  for  mind,  and  the  consequence  is,  that  all 
who  desire  to  engage  in  other  pursuits  than  those  of  agriculture  fly  to  the 
South.  There  are  now  within  the  Union,  it  is  said,  not  less  than  200,000 
Canadians,  and  with  every  day  the  tendency  to  emigration  increases.*  If  we 
look  to  Nova  Scotia  and  New  Brunswick,  it  is  the  same.  There  is  there 
no  demand  for  intellect,  and  any  man  possessing  it  flies  southward.  Forty 
years  since  it  was  asked,  "  Who  reads  an  American  book  ?"  That  question 
has  long  since  been  answered ;  but  it  may  now  be  repeated  in  reference  to 
all  the  British  provinces.  Who  reads  a  Canadian,  a  Nova-Scotian,  or  a  New 
Brunswick  book  ?  Upper  Canada  has  two  paper-mills  capable  of  producing 
about  ten  reams  of  paper  per  day,  being,  perhaps,  a  tenth  of  what  is  re- 
quired to  supply  the  newspapers  of  Cincinnati.  Forty  years  since,  the  ques- 
tion might  have  been  asked,  Who  uses  an  American  machine  ?"  and  yet  the 
machine  shops  of  Austria  and  Russia  are  now  directed  by  our  countrymen, 
and  the  latest  improvements  in  machinery  for  the  conversion  of  wool  into 
cloth  are  of  American  invention.  The  British  provinces  have  had  the  ad- 
vantage of  perfect  free  trade  with  England,  the  consequence  of  which  is, 
that  they  are  almost  destitute  of  paper-mills  and  printing-oflices,  and  machine 
shops  are  unknown,  while  the  Union  has  been  a  prey  to  the  protective  sys- 
tem, that  "  war  upon  labour  and  capital,"  the  consequence  of  which  is,  that 
paper-mills  and  printing-oflices  abound  to  an  extent  unknown  in  the  world, 
and  almost  equal  in  number  and  power  to  those  of  the  whole  world,  f  and 
machine  shops  exist  almost  everywhere.  These  differences  are  not  due  to 
any  difference  in  the  abundance  or  quality  of  land,  for  that  of  Upper  Canada 
is  yet  to  a  great  extent  unoccupied,  and  is  in  quality  inferior  to  none  on  the 
continent.  They  are  not  due  to  difference  in  other  natural  advantages,  for 
New  Brunswick  has  every  advantage  possessed  by  Maine  and  New  Hamp- 
shire, and  Nova  Scotia  has  coal  and  iron  ore  more  advantageously  situated 
than  any  in  the  Union.  They  are  not  due  to  difference  of  taxation,  for 
Great  Britain  has  paid  almost  all  the  expenses  of  government.  To  what, 
then,  can  they  be  attributed,  but  to  the  fact  that  those  provinces  have  been 
subject  to  the  monopoly  system,  and  compelled  to  waste  their  own  labour 
while  giving  their  products  in  exchange  for  the  services  of  English  men,  wo- 
men, and  children,  employed  in  doing  for  them  what  they  could  have  better 
done  themselves,  and  losing  four-fifths  of  their  products  in  the  transit  between 
the  producer  and  the  consumer  ?  Place  the  colony  within  the  Union — give 
it  protection — and  in  a  dozen  years  its  paper-mills  and  its  printing-offices 
will  become  numerous,  and  many  will  then  read  Canadian  books. 

In  England,  a  large  portion  of  the  people  can  neither  read  nor  write,  and 
there  is  scarcely  an  effort  to  give  them  education.  The  colonial  system  looks 
to  low  wages,  necessarily  followed  by  an  inability  to  devote  time  to  intel- 
lectual improvement.  Protection  looks  to  the  high  wages  that  enable  the 
labourer  to  improve  his  mind,  and  educate  his  children.  The  English 
child,  transferred  to  this  country,  becomes  an  educated  and  responsible  being. 
If  he  remain  at  home,  he  remains  in  brutish  ignorance.  To  increase  the 

*  «  I  do  not  exaggerate  when  I  say  that  there  are  no  less  than  200,000  Canadians  in  the 
United  States ;  and,  unless  efficacious  means  are  taken  to  stop  this  frightful  emigration, 
before  ten  years  two  hundred  thousand  more  of  our  compatriots  will  have  carried  to  the 
American  Union  their  arms,  their  intelligence,  and  their  hearts." — Letter  of  Rev.  Arthur 
Chiniguy. 

f  The  whole  quantity  of  paper  required  to  supply  the  newspaper  press  of  Great  Britain 
and  Ireland  is  170,000  reams;  while  that  required  for  the  supply  of  four  papen  printed 
in  New  York,  Philadelphia,  and  Baltimore,  is  about  110,000.  and  the  whole  number  o< 
newspapers  is  about  2400. 


THE   HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS.  213 

productiveness  of  labour,  education  is  necessary.     Protection  tends  to  the 
diffusion  of  education,  and  the  elevation  of  the  condition  of  the  labourer. 

At  no  period  of  our  history  has  the  demand  for  books  and  pictures,  or  the 
compensation  of  authors  or  artists,  been  less  than  in  the  period  of  1842-43 
At  none  have  they  grown  so  rapidly  as  from  1844  to  1847.  They  now  tend 
downward,  notwithstanding  a  demand  that  is  still  maintained  by  the  power 
that  yet  exists  of  obtaining  merchandise  in  exchange  for  certificates  of  dobt. 
When  that  shall  pass  away,  we  shall  see  a  recurrence  of  the  events  of  ike 
free  trade  period. 

If  we  desire  to  raise  the  intellectual  standard  of  man  throughout  the  world, 
our  object  can  be  accomplished  only  by  raising  the  value  of  man,  as  a  ma- 
chine, throughout  the  world.  Every  man  brought  here  is  raised,  and  every 
man  so  brought  tends  to  diminish  the  supposed  surplus  of  men  elsewhere. 
Men  come  when  the  reward  of  labour  is  high,  as  they  did  between  1844  and 
1848.  They  return  disappointed  when  the  reward,  of  labour  is  small,  as  is 
now  the  case.  Protection  tends  to  increase  the  reward  of  labour,  and  to  im- 
prove the  intellectual  condition  of  man. 

CHAPTER  TWENTY-THIRD. 
HOW  PROTECTION  AFFECTS   THE  POLITICAL   CONDITION   OF   MAN. 

THE  larger  the  return  to  labour,  the  greater  will  be  the  power  to  accumu- 
late capital.  The  larger  the  proportion  which  capital  seeking  to  be  employed 
bears  to  the  labourers  who  are  to  employ  it,  the  larger  will  be  the  wages  of 
labour,  the  greater  the  power  of  the  labourer  to  accumulate  for  himself,  and 
the  more  perfect  will  be  his  control  over  the  disposition  of  his  labour  and  the 
application  of  its  proceeds,  whether  to  private  or  to  public  purposes. 

The  freeman  chooses  his  employer,  sells  his  labour,  and  disposes  of  the 
proceeds  at  his  pleasure.  The  slave  does  none  of  these  things.  His  master 
takes  the  produce  of  his  labour,  and  returns  him  such  portion  as  suits  his 
pleasure. 

Throughout  the  world,  and  in  all  ages,  freedom  has  advanced  with  every 
increase  in  the  ratio  of  wealth  to  population.  When  the  people  of  England 
were  poor,  they  were  enslaved,  but  with  growing  wealth  they  have  become 
more  free.  So  has  it  been  in  Belgium  and  in  France.  So  is  it  now  in 
Russia  and  Germany,  and  so  must  it  everywhere  be.  India  is  poor,  and  the 
many  are  slaves  to  the  few.  So  is  it  in  Ireland.  Freedom  is  there  unknown. 
The  poor  Irishman,  limited  to  the  labours  of  agriculture,  desires  a  bit  of 
land,  and  he  gives  the  chief  part  of  the  product  of  his  year's  labour  for 
permission  to  starve  upon  the  balance,  happy  to  be  permitted  to  remain  on 
payment  of  this  enormous  rent.  He  is  the  slave  of  the  land-owner,  without 
even  the  slave's  right  to  claim  of  him  support  in  case  of  sickness,  or  if,  es- 
caping from  famine,  he  should  survive  to  an  age  that  deprives  him  of  the 
power  of  labouring  for  his  support.  England  employs  fleets,  paid  for  out  of 
taxes  imposed  on  starving  Irishmen,  to  prevent  the  people  of  Brazil  from 
buying  black  men,  and  women,  and  children,  on  the  coast  of  Africa,  while 
holding  herself  ready  to  give  white  men,  and  women,  and  children,  to  any 
who  will  carry  them  from  her  shores,  and  even  to  add  thereto  a  portion  of 
the  cost  of  their  transportation ;  and  this  she  does  without  requiring  the 
transporter  to  produce  even  the  slightest  evidence  that  they  have  been 
delivered  at  their  destined  port  in  "  good  order  and  well-conditioned." 
When  Ireland  shall  become  rich,  labour  will  become  valuable,  and  man  will 
become  free.  When  Italy  was  filled  with  prosperous  communities,  labour 
was  productive,  and  it  was  in  demand ;  and  then  men  who  had  it  to  sell 
fixed  the  price  at  which  it  should  be  sold.  With  growing  poverty,  labour 


214  THE   HARMONY  OF  INTERESTS. 


ceased  to  be  in  demand,  and  the  buyer  fixed  the  price.  The  labourer  then 
became  a  slave.  If  we  follow  the  history  of  Tuscany,  we  can  find  men 
becoming  enslaved  as  poverty  succeeded  wealth ;  and  again  may  we  trace 
them  becoming  more  and  more  free,  as  wealth  has  grown  with  continued 
peace.  So  has  it  been  in  Egypt,  and  Sicily,  and  Spain.  Everywhere 
poverty,  or  a  deficiency  of  those  aids  to  labour  which  constitute  wealth,  is, 
and  has  invariably  been,  the  companion  of  slavery  j  and  everywhere  wealth, 
or  an  abundance  of  ploughs,  and  harrows,  and  horses,  and  cows,  and  oxen, 
and  cultivated  lands,  and  houses,  and  mills,  is,  and  has  invariably  been  the 
companion,  and  the  cause,  of  freedom. 

If  protection  be  a  "  war  upon  labour  and  capital,"  it  must  tend  to  prevent 
the  growth  of  wealth,  and  thus  to  deteriorate  the  political  condition  of  man. 

The  farmer  who  exchanges  his  food  with  the  man  who  produces  iron  by 
means  of  horses,  wagons,  canal-boats,  merchants,  ships,  and  sailors,  gives 
much  food  for  little  iron.  The  iron  man,  who  exchanges  his  products  for 
food  through  the  instrumentality  of  the  same  machinery,  gives  much  iron  for 
little  food.  The  chief  part  of  the  product  is  swallowed  up  by  the  men  who 
stand  between,  and  grow  rich  while  the  producers  remain  poor.  The  growth 
of  wealth  is  thus  prevented,  and  inequality  of  political  condition  is  maintained. 

The  farmer  who  exchanges  directly  with  the  producer  of  iron  gives  labour 
for  labour.  Both  thus  grow  rich,  because  the  class  that  desires  to  stand  be- 
tween has  no  opportunity  of  enriching  themselves  at  their  expense.  Equality 
of  condition  is  thus  promoted. 

The  object  of  protection  is  that  of  bringing  the  consumer  of  food  to  take 
his  place  by  the  side  of  the  producer  .of  food,  and  thus  promoting  the  growth 
of  wealth  and  the  improvement  of  political  condition.  That  it  does  produce 
that  effect,  is  obvious  from  the  fact  that,  in  periods  of  protection,  such  vast 
numbers  seek  our  shores,  and  that  immigration  becomes  stationary,  or 
diminishes,  with  every  approach  towards  that  system  which  is  usually  deno- 
minated free  trade. 

The  colonial  system  is  based  upon  cheap  labour.  Protection  seeks  to  in- 
crease the  reward  of  labour.  The  one  fills  factories  with  children  of  tender 
years,  and  expels  men  to  Canada  and  Australia;  the  other  unites  the  men 
and  sends  the  children  to  school. 

The  Irishman  at  home  is  a  slave.  He  prays  for  permission  to  remain  and 
pay  in  pounds  sterling  for  quarters  of  acres,  and  his  request  is  refused. 
Transfer  him  here  and  he  becomes  a  freeman,  choosing  his  employer  and 
fixing  the  price  of  his  labour.  The  Highlander  is  a  slave  that  would  gladly 
remain  at  home  ;  but  he  is  expelled  to  make  room  for  sheep.  One-ninth  of 
the  population  of  England  are  slaves  to  the  parish  beadle,  eating  the  bread  of 
enforced  charity,  and  a  large  portion  of  the  remaining  eight-ninlhs  are  slaves 
to  the  policy  which  produces  a  constant  recurrence  of  chills  and  fevers — over- 
work at  small  wages  at  one  time,  and  no  work  at  any  wages  at  another. 
Transfer  them  here  and  they  become  freemen,  selecting  their  employers  and 
fixing  the  hours  and  the  reward  of  labour.  The  Hindoo  is  a  slave.  His 
landlord's  officers  fix  the  quantity  of  land  that  he  must  cultivate,  and  the 
rent  he  must  pay.  He  is  not  allowed,  on  payment  even  of  the  high  survey 
assessment  fixed  on  each  field,  to  cultivate  only  those  fields  to  which  he  gives 
the  preference ;  his  task  is  assigned  to  him,  and  he  is  constrained  to  occupy 
all  such  fields  as  are  allotted  to  him  by  the  revenue  officers,  and  whether  he 
cultivates  them  or  not,  he  is  saddled  with  the  rent  of  all.  If  driven  by 
these  oppressions  to  fly  and  seek  a  subsistence  elsewhere,  he  is  followed 
wherever  he  goes  and  oppressed  at  discretion,  or  deprived  of  the  advantages 
he  might  expect  from  a  change  of  residence.  If  he  work  for  wages,  he  is 
paid  in  money  when  grain  is  high,  and  in  grain  when  it  is  low.  He,  there- 


THE  HARMONY  OF  INTERESTS.  215 


fore,  has  no  power  to  determine  the  price  of  his  labour.  Could  he  be-  trans- 
ferred here,  he  would  be  found  an  efficient  labourer,  and  would  consume  more 
cotton  in  a  week  than  he  now  does  in  a  year,  and  by  the  change  his  political 
condition  would  be  greatly  improved. 

Protection  looks  to  the  improvement  of  the  political  condition  of  the  human 
race.  To  accomplish  that  object,  it  is  needed  that  the  value  of  man  be  raised, 
and  that  men  should  everywhere  be  placed  in  a  conditi  jn  to  sell  their  labour 
to  the  highest  bidder — to  the  man  who  will  give  in  return  the  largest  quan- 
tity of  food,  clothing,  shelter,  and  other  of  the  comf  jrts  of  life.  To  enable 
the  Hindoo  to  sell  his  labour  and  to  fix  its  price,  it  is  necessary  to  raise  the 
price  of  his  chief  product,  cotton.  That  is  to  be  done  by  increasing  the 
consumption,  and  that  object  is  to  bo  attained  by  diminishing  the  waste  of 
labour  attendant  upon  its  transit  between  the  producer  and  the  consumer. 
Fill  this  country  with  furnaces  and  mills,  and  railroads  will  be  made  in 
every  direction,  and  the  consumption  of  cotton  will  speedily  rise  to  twenty 
pounds  per  head,  while  millions  of  European  labourers,  mechanics,  farmers, 
and  capitalists  will  cross  the  Atlantic,  and  every  million  will  be  a  customer 
for  one-fourth  as  much  as  was  consumed  by  the  people  of  Great  Britain 
and  Ireland  in  1847.  The  harmony  of  the  interests  of  the  cotton-growers 
throughout  the  world  is  perfect,  and  all  the  discord  comes  from  the  power  of 
the  exchangers  to  produce  apparent  discord. 

It  is  asserted,  however,  that  protection  tends  to  build  up  a  body  of  capi- 
talists at  the  expense  of  the  consumer,  and  thus  produce  inequality  of  condi- 
tion. That  such  is  the  effect  of  inadequate  protection  is  not  to  be  doubted. 
So  long  as  we  continue  under  a  necessity  for  seeking  in  England  a  market  for 
our  surplus  products,  her  markets  will  fix  the  price  for  the  world,  and  so  kmg 
as  we  shall  continue  to  be  under  a  necessity  for  seeking  there  a  small  supply 
of  cloth  or  iron,  so  long  will  the  prices  in  her  markets  fix  the  price  of  all, 
and  the  domestic  producer  of  cloth  and  iron  will  profit  by  the  difference  of 
freight  both  out  and  home.  With  this  profit  he  takes  the  risk  of  ruin,  which 
is  of  perpetual  occurrence  among  the  men  of  small  capitals.  Those  who  are 
already  wealthy  have  but  to  stop  their  furnaces  or  mills  until  prices  rise,  and 
then  they  have  the  markets  to  themselves,  for  their  poorer  competitors  have 
been  ruined.  Such  is  the  history  of  many  of  the  large  fortunes  accumulated 
by  the  manufacture  of  cloth  and  iron  in  this  country,  and  such  the  almost 
universal  history  of  every  effort  to  establish  manufactures  south  and  west 
of  New  England. 

Inadequate  and  uncertain  protection  benefits  the  fanner  and  planter  little, 
while  the  uncertainty  attending  it  tends  to  make  the  rich  richer  and  the  poor 
poorer,  thus  producing  social  and  political  inequality. 

Adequate  and  certain  protection,  on  the  contrary,  tends  to  the  production 
of  equality — first,  because  by  its  aid  the  necessity  for  depending  on  foreign 
markets  for  the  sale  of  oir  products,  or  the  supply  of  our  wants,  will  ba 
brought  to  an  end,  and  thenceforth  the  prices,  being  fixed  at  home,  will  be 
steady,  and  then  the  smaller  capitalist  will  be  enabled  to  maintain  competi- 
tion with  the  larger  one,  with  great  advantage  to  the  consumers — farmers, 
planters,  and  labourers ;  and,  second,  because  its  benefits  will  be,  as  they 
always  have  been,  felt  chiefly  by  the  many  with  whom  the  •price  of  labour 
constitutes  the  sole  fund  out  of  which  they  are  to  be  maintained. 

If  we  take  the  labour  that  is  employed  in  the  factories  of  the  country,  from 
one  extremity  to  the  other,  it  will  be  found  that  nearly  the  whole  of  it  would 
be  waste,  if  not  so  employed.  If  we  take  that  which  is  employed  in  getting 
out  the  timber  and  the  stone  for  building  factories  and  furnaces,  it  will  be 
found  that  a  large  portion  of  it  would  otherwise  be  waste.  If  we  inquire 
into  the  operations  of  the  farmer,  we  find  that  the  vicinity  of  a  factory,  or 


216  THE   HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS. 

furnace,  enables  him  to  save  much  of  the  labour  of  transportation,  and  to  sell 
many  things  that  would  otherwise  be  waste.  Thus  far,  the  advantage  would 
seem  to  be  all  on  the  side  of  the  employed,  and  not  on  that  of  the  employer. 

Let  us  now  suppose  that  all  protection  were  abolished,  and  that  perfect 
freedom  of  trade  were  established/  and  that  the  result  were,  as  it  inevitably 
would  be,  to  close  every  factory,  furnace,  rolling  mill,  and  coal-mine  in  the 
country,  and  see  what  would  be  the  result.  The  owners  of  such  property 
wo\ild  lose  a  few  millions  of  dollars  of  rents,  or  profits,  but  the  s"ppl.y  of 
fuel  would  be  less  by  three  millions  of  tons,  that  of  iron  would  be  less  by 
eight  hundred  thousand  tons,  and  that  of  cotton  cloth  would  be  less  by  almost 
a  thousand  millions  of  yards.  The  demand  for  the  labour  now  employed  in 
the  production  of  those  commodities  would  be  at  an  end,  and  the  spare-labour 
of  men,  and  women,  and  children,  and  wagons,  and  horses,  and  the  various 
things  now  used  in  and  about  factories  and  furnaces,  would  then  be  wasted, 
coal  and  iron  and  cloth  would  be  doubled  in  price,  and  labour  would  be  di- 
minished in  a  corresponding  degree.  The  power  to  import  iron,  or  coal, 
or  cloth,  would  not  be  increased  by  a  single  ton,  or  yard,  and  the  peoj^ 
would  be  compelled  to  dispense  with  necessaries  of  life  that  are  now  readily 
obi&Ined.  The  capitalists,  whose  means  were  locked  up  in  factories  or  fur- 
naces, would  suffer  some  loss ;  but  the  mass  of  persons  possessed  of  dis- 
engaged capital,  and  the  receivers  of  State  dividends,  would  be  able  to  com- 
mand, for  the  same  reward,  a  much  larger  quantity  of  labour  than  before. 

The  object  of  protection  is  that  of  securing  a  demand  for  labour,  and  its 
tendency  is  to  produce  equality  of  condition.  The  jealousy  of  "  overgrown- 
capitalists"  has  caused  many  changes  of  policy  ;  but,  so  far  as  they  have 
tended  to  the  abolition  of  protection,  they  have  invariably  tended  to  the 
production  of  inequality.  The  wealthy  capitalist  suffers  some  loss ;  but  he 
is  not  ruined.  A  change  takes  place,  and  he  is  ready  to  avail  himself  of  it, 
and  at  once  regains  all  that  had  been  lost,  with  vast  increase.  The  small 
capitalist  has  been  swept  away,  and  his  mill  is  in  a  state  of  ruin.  By  the 
time  he  can  prepare  himself  to  recommence  his  business,  the  chance  being 
past,  he  is  swept  away  again,  and  perhaps  for  the  last  time. 

For  months  past,  the  rate  of  interest  on  a  certain  species  of  securities  has 
been  very  low.  The  wealthy  man  could  borrow  at  four  per  cent. ;  the  poor 
man,  requiring  a  small  loan  on  a  second-rate  security,  could  scarcely  obtain 
it  at  any  price.  The  man  who  has  coal  to  sell,  or  iron  to  sell,  must  have  the 
aid  of  middlemen  to  act  as  endorsers  upon  the  paper  received  from  his  cus- 
tomers, and  their  commissions  absorb  the  profits.  The  wages  of  the  miner 
have  been  greatly  reduced,  while  the  profits  of  the  speculator  have  been 
increased.  The  reason  of  all  this  is,  that,  throughout  the  nation,  there  pre- 
vails no  confidence  in  the  future.  It  is  seen  that  we  are  consuming  more 
than  we  produce;  that  our  exports  do  not  pay  for  our  imports;  that  we  are 
running  iu  debt ;  that  furnaces  and  mills  are  being  closed ;  and  every  one 
knows  what  must  be  the  end  of  such  a  system.  Re-enact  the  tariff  of  1842, 
and  the  trade  of  the  middleman  would  be  at  an  end,  because  confidence  in 
the  future  would  be  felt  from  one  extremity  of  the  land  to  the  other.  Should 
we  not  find  in  this  some  evidence  of  the  soundness  of  the  principle  upon  which 
it  was  based  ?  The  system  which  gives  confidence  must  be  right ;  that  which 
destroys  it  must  be  wrong. 

Confidence  in  the  future — Hope — gives  power  to  individuals  and  commu- 
nities. It  is  that  which  enables  the  poor  man  to  become  rich,  and  the  cha- 
racter of  all  legislative  action  is  to  be  judged  by  its  greater  or  less  tend- 
ency to  produce  this  effect.  A  review  cf  the  measures  urged  upon  the  nation 
by  the  advocates  of  the  system  miscalled  free  trade,  shows,  almost  without 
an  exception-  they  have  tended  to  the  destruction  of  confidence,  and  there- 


THE   HARMONY   OF  INTERESTS.  217 

fore  to  the  production  of  the  political  revolutions  referred  to  in  the  first 
chapter. 

The  direct  effect  of  the  insecurity  that  has  existed  has  been  to  centralize 
the  business  of  manufacture  in  one  part  of  the  Union  and  in  the  hands  of  a 
comparatively  limited  number  of  persons — such  as  could  afford  to  take  large 
risks,  in  hope  of  realizing  large  profits.  Had  the  tariff  of  1828  been  made 
the  settled  law  of  the  land,  the  Middle  and  Southern  States  would  now  be 
studded  with  factories  and  furnaces,  and  while  the  North  and  East  would  not 
have  been  less  rich,  they  would  be  far  richer,  and  the  present  inequality  of 
condition  would  not  now  exist. 

The  power  of  the  North,  as  compared  with  that  of  the  South,  is  due  to 
the  jealousy  of  the  former  entertained  by  the  latter,  which  has  prevented  the 
establishment  of  a  decided  system,  having  for  its  object  the  destruction  of 
the  English  monopoly,  and  the  ultimate  establishment  of  perfect  freedom  of 
trade. 

The  object  of  the  colonial  system  was  that  of  taxing  the  world  for  the 
maintenance  of  a  great  mercantile,  manufacturing,  and  landed  aristocracy,  and 
the  mode  of  accomplishment  was  that  of  securing  a  monopoly  of  machinery. 
The  object  of  protection  is  to  break  down  that  monopoly,  and  with  it  the 
aristocracy  that  collects  for  the  people  of  Great  Britain  and  the  world  those 
immense  taxes,  to  be  appropriated  to  the  payment  of  fleets  and  armies 
officered  by  younger  sons,  and  kept  on  foot  for  the  maintenance  of  the  exist- 
ing inequality  in  Great  Britain,  Ireland,  and  India.  All,  therefore,  who 
desire  to  see  improvement  in  the  political  condition  of  the  people  of  the 
world  should  advocate  the  system  which  tends  to  break  down  monopoly  and 
establish  perfect  freedom  of  trade. 

CHAPTER  TWENTY-FOURTH. 
HOW  PROTECTION  AFFECTS   CREDIT — INDIVIDUAL  AND   NATIONAL. 

THE  existence  of  credit  is  evidence  of  the  existence  of  confidence  that  the 
man  who  desires  to  obtain  for  a  time  the  use  of  property  intends  to  return  it. 
The  more  universal  this  confidence,  the  more  readily  can  the  capitalist  place 
his  funds,  and  the  larger  will  be  the  return.  The  more  universal  it  is,  the 
more  readily  can  the  labourer  obtain  the  necessary  aids  to  labour,  and  the 
more  productive  will  be  that  labour.  If  protection  be  "  a  war  upon  labour 
and  capital,"  it  must  tend  to  destroy  the  confidence  of  man  in  his  fellow- 
man. 

The  object  of  protection  is  that  of  bringing  the  consumer  to  take  his  place 
by  the  side  of  the  producer,  exchanging  labour  for  labour,  and  thus  diminish- 
ing the  necessity  for  credit.  Its  effect  is  to  diminish  the  machinery  of  ex- 
change, and  thus  to  increase  the  productiveness  of  labour,  and  with  it  the 
power  to  obtain  credit. 

The  object  of  the  monopoly  system  is  that  of  separating  the  consumet 
from  the  producer,  and  compelling  both  to  repose  confidence  in  distant  men, 
thus  increasing  the  necessity  for  credit.  Its  effect  is  that  of  increasing  the 
machinery  of  exchange,  and  diminishing  the  productiveness  of  labour,  and 
thus  diminishing  the  power  to  obtain  credit. 

That  such  is  its  effect  in  the  colonies  of  Great  Britain,  we  know.  In 
India,  once  so  wealthy,  the  ordinary  rate  of  interest  is  twelve  per  cent. ;  but 
the  poor  cultivator  borrows  seed  at  the  rate  of  one  hundred  per  cent.  Credit 
there  has  no  existence,  and  yet  almost  the  whole  exchanges  of  the  country  are 
made  at  a  distance  of  many  thousands  of  miles,  by  men  in  whom  the  con 
Burner  and  producer  are  compelled  to  repose  confidence. 

In  the  West  Indies,  credit  has  almost  entirely  disappeared.     In  Canada, 


218  THE   HARMONY  OF  INTERESTS. 

even  the  government  cannot  effect  loans  without  a  guaranty  from  parlia- 
ment. So  is  it  throughout  the  whole  range  of  colonies. 

At  home,  capital  is  cheap,  because  of  the  want  of  general  confidence.  The 
capitalist  takes  two  per  cent. ;  but  the  labourer  could  not  borrow  at  thirty 
per  cent.  The  capitalist  that  owns  machinery  is  enabled  to  dictate  the  terms 
upon  which  it  shall  be  used  by  those  who  work.  Sometimes  he  employs  many 
work-people.  At  others  few.  Sometimes  he  works  long  time,  and  at  others 
short  time.  At  all  times  his  people  obtain  but  a  small  proportion  of  the 
products  of  labour ;  but  at  many  times  they  obtain  but  a  very  small  propor- 
tion, while  at  others  they  are  unable  to  obtain  the  use  of  machinery  at  any 
price. 

Abroad,  the  credit  of  English  merchants  is  falling  daily.  But  recently, 
there  were  in  the  great  city  of  Liverpool,  scarcely  half  a  dozen  houses  that 
could  be  trusted  with  a  cargo  of  cotton.  Such  are  the  effects  of  the  system 
in  which  "  Commerce  is  king,"  and  the  consumer  and  the  producer  are  placed 
at  the  mercy  of  the  exchanger. 

At  no  period  in  this  country  did  confidence  grow  more  rapidly  than  in  the 
period  between  1830  and  1834.  At  none  did  it  decline  with  such  rapidity 
as  between  1835  and  1842.  With  the  action  of  the  tariff  of  1842,  it  was 
restored,  but  with  that  of  1846  it  again  declines.  There  is  no  demand  for 
capital,  and  it  is  cheap.  There  is  little  demand  for  labour,  and  it  too  is 
cheap. 

Never,  probably,  since  the  settlement  of  the  country,  did  the  poor  man 
find  so  much  difficulty  in  obtaining  the  aid  of  capital,  as  in  1842,  the  period 
of  free  trade.  Never  has  he  found  it  more  easy  than  between  1844  and 
1847.  The  period  of  distrust  has  again  arrived.  Money  is  said  to  be 
abundant,  but  the  security  must  be  undoubted,  and  the  poor  man  pays  two 
per  cent,  a  month  for  the  use  of  capital  that  the  rich  man  cannot  invest  to 
produce  him  more  than  four  per  cent,  per  annum.  There  is  no  confidence 
existing. 

"  Notwithstanding  the  cheapness  and  abundance  of  money,"  says  the  New 
York  Herald,  "  no  one  seems  disposed  to  touch  any  thing  in  the  way  of 
speculation,  and  capitalists  prefer  loaning  money  at  four  per  cent,  interest, 
on  good  security,  to  purchasing  stocks  at  present  prices.  They  say  that  when 
they  lend  money  on  first-rate  security,  at  a  low  rate  of  interest,  they  are  sure 
of  the  principal  and  a  small  amount  of  interest,  when  they  want  it." 

The  re-establishment  of  the  tariff  of  1842  would  restore  confidence,  and 
produce  a  demand  for  labour,  and  wages  would  rise — and  a  demand  for 
capital,  the  price  of  which  would  also  rise,  and  thus  it  would  appear  that  in 
protection  is  to  be  found  the  harmony  of  interest  between  the  labourer  and 
the  capitalist. 

NATIONAL   CREDIT. 

From  1830  to  1835,  the  national  credit  grew,  for  we  paid  for  what  we 
imported.  From  1835  to  1840,  credit  declined,  for  we  ran  largely  in  debt  for 
cloth  and  iron,  for  which  our  exports  could  not  pay.  In  1842,  national  credit 
disappeared,  for  we  were  unable  to  pay  even  the  interest  on  our  debts.  From 
1843  to  1848,  national  credit  grew,  for  we  paid  interest  and  commenced  the 
reduction  of  the  debt.  In  the  last  two  years  we  have  gone  largely  in  debt,  and 
must  now  either  diminish  our  imports  or  run  further  into  debt. 

How  long  we  can  continue  to  do  this,  does  not  depend  upon  ourselves. 
Any  circumstance  producing  a  change  in  the  rate  of  interest  in  Europe, 
would  cause  our  certificates  of  debt  to  be  returned  upon  us  for  payment,  and 
what  then  would  be  the  state  of  the  national  credit  ?  A  nation  that  is  largely 
in  debt  is  always  in  danger  of  losing  its  credit. 


THE  HARMONY  OF   INTERESTS.  219 


CHAPTER  TWENTY-FIFTH. 
HOW  PROTECTION   AFFECTS   REVENUE  AND   EXPENDITURE. 

THE  more  men  live  and  work  in  connection  with  each  other,  the  greater  is 
their  power  to  protect  themselves.  The  more  widely  they  are  separated 
from  each  other,  the  greater  is  their  necessity  for  seeking  protection  from 
others. 

The  more  they  live  in  connection  with  each  other,  the  larger  will  be  the 
product  of  their  labour,  and  the  greater  will  be  their  power  to  contribute 
towards  the  maintenance  of  peace  and  order.  The  less  they  live  in  con- 
nection with  each  other,  the  less  productive  will  be  their  labour,  and  the  lesa 
will  be  their  power  to  contribute  to  that  object. 

With  every  increase  in  the  productiveness  of  labour,  the  power  of  self- 
government  thus  increases,  with  increased  power  to  contribute. towards  the 
expenditures  incident  to  the  maintenance  of  government ;  and  with  every  di- 
minution therein,  the  power  of  self-government  decreases,  with  diminished 
power  to  contribute  towards  the  public  revenue  required  for  paying  others 
for  performing  the  duties  of  government. 

If  protection  be,  as  is  asserted,  a  "  war  upon  labour  and  capital,"  it  must 
increase  the  necessity  for  government  by  others,  and  diminish  the  power  to 
contribute  towards  its  maintenance. 

The  object  of  protection  is,  however,  that  of  enabling  men  to  live  in  con- 
nection with  each  other,  the  consumer  taking  his  place  by  the  side  of  the 
producer,  each  protecting,  and  protected  by,  the  other.  This  would  seem  to 
diminish  the  necessity  for  seeking  protection  from  others.  Another  object  of 
protection  is  that  of  enabling  men  to  exchange  with  each  other,  giving  labour 
for  labour,  without  paying  so  many  persons  for  standing  between  them. 
This  would  seem  calculated  to  increase  their  power  to  pay  for  protection, 
should  it  be  needed. 

The  object  of  the  monopoly  system — now  known  by  the  name  of  free  trade 
— is  that  of  separating  the  consumer  from  the  producer,  and  diminishing 
their  power  to  protect  each  other.  Their  exchanges  are  to  be  always  made 
in  distant  markets,  and  many  wagons,  ships,  and  men  are  to  stand  between, 
for  the  care  of  which  fleets  and  armies  are  needed.  This  would  seem  to  in- 
crease their  necessity  for  protection,  while  the  diminished  power  of  combina- 
tion of  action  would  seem  to  tend  to  decrease  their  power  of  paying  for  pro- 
tection. 

How  stand  the  facts  ?  The  question  will  be  answered  by  placing  side  by 
side  the  expenditures  under  the  different  systems  : — 

Protection.  Free  trade. 

Per  annum.  Per  annum. 

1829  to  1834  .  $16,800,000  1834  to  1841  .  831,700,000 

1843  to  1845  .  20,700,000  1846  to  1849  .  44,500,000 

The  necessity  for  contributing  towards  the  support  of  government  seems  to 
have  increased  with  the  approach  towards  free  trade,  and  to  have  diminished 
as  we  approached  protection. 

The  revenue  from  customs  in  the  several  periods,  was  as  follows : — 

Per  head.  Per  head. 

1830  to  1834    .     .    $1-75  1835  to  1841     .     .    0-84J 

1843  to  1847    .     .      1-36  1848^9       .     .     .     1— 

I  exclude  here  the  year  1847-48,  because  it  was  an  entirely  exceptional 
one.  We  had  imported  a  large  amount  of  free  goods — specie — in  the  pre- 
ceding year,  and  we  exported  it  again  in  1847-48,  to  exchange  for  duty- 


220  THE   HARMONY  OF   INTERESTS. 

paying  ones,  and  the  whole  amount  of  duty  received  upon  the  goods  so  ob- 
tained in  exchange,  should  be  added  to  the  revenue  of  1846-47. 

The  power  to  contribute  towards  the  revenue  certainly  decreased  in  the 
years  of  free  trade,  and  precisely  as  the  necessity  for  contributions  increased. 
The  amount  actually  paid  was  greater  than  is  here  set  down,  because  the 
government  collected,  between  1834  and  1841,  a  large  amount  of  duties  upon 
goods  received  in  exchange  for  certificates  of  debt ;  but  that  was  merely  a 
payment  in  advance  of  production,  and  the  consequence  of  receiving  such 
payment  was,  that  it  was  nearly  bankrupt  in  1842,  and  compelled  to  borrow 
almost  thirty  millions  to  provide  for  the  continuance  of  its  own  existence. 

We  are  now  doing  the  same  thing.  The  amount  of  debt  incurred  in  the 
last  year  was  not  less  than  twenty-two  millions,  and  upon  this  the  govern- 
ment obtained  duties,  as  before,  in  advance  of  production,  to  the  extent  of 
almost  seven  millions.  If  the  power  to  buy  on  credit  were  now  to  cease,  the 
amount  collected  would  fall  to  twenty-two  millions.  Were  the  debt  con- 
tracted last  year  now  to  be  paid,  it  would  fall  to  fifteen  millions,  arid  a  large 
addition  would  have  to  be  made  to  the  public  debt,  as  in  1841-42.  How 
long  a  time  is  to  elapse  before  such  will  be  the  state  of  things,  it  is  not  for 
me  to  predict ;  but  if  we  make  this  year  a  further  addition  of  twenty  millions 
to  our  foreign  debt,  and  close  as  many  furnaces  as  we  did  in  the  last  one,  the 
day  for  it  cannot  be  far  distant. 

The  power  to  contribute  towards  the  maintenance  of  government  depends 
upon  the  power  of  production,  and  every  circumstance  tending  to  diminish 
the  one  tends  equally  to  the  diminution  of  the  other.  The  power  of  pro- 
duction is  now  rapidly  diminishing,  and  must  continue  so  to  do. 

Such  likewise  is  the  case  in  England.  From  year  to  year  the  payment  of 
taxes  is  becoming  more  and  more  onerous,  notwithstanding  so  large  a  portion 
of  them  is  thrown  upon  the  farmers  and  planters  of  the  earth,  by  aid  of  the 
system  under  which  they  are  compelled  to  give  more  food,  cotton,  tobacco, 
and  sugar,  for  less  and  less  cloth  and  iron  ;  and  yet  from  year  to  year  the 
expenditures  have  been  increasing.  Poverty  produced  rebellion  in  Ireland, 
and  chartism  in  England,  and  thus  increased  the  necessity  for  soldiers  and 
sailors.  The  exhaustion  of  the  older  provinces  of  India  led  to  a  desire  for 
Afghanistan,  Scinde,  and  the  Punjaub ;  and  the  failure  of  a  market  for 
labour  in  the  form  of  cotton,  dreve  the  Hindoo  to  opium,  which  led  to  a  war 
in  China,  and  thus  was  made  a  demand  for  fleets  and  armies.  The  poverty 
of  Canada  led  to  rebellion,  and  to  the  building  of  forts  and  ships.  The 
anxiety  to  secure  foreign  markets  has  led  to  immense  expenses  for  steam- 
ships and  mail  steamers,  and  thus  the  more  the  system  tends  to  fail,  the 
greater  is  the  expenditure  for  its  maintenance,  and  the  less  the  ability  of  the 
people  of  England,  and  the  farmers  and  planters  of  the  world,  to  contribute 
thereto. 

Let  us  now  look  to  the  other  source  of  our  national  revenue — the  PUBLIC 
lands. 

The  higher  the  value  of  labour,  the  more  of  it  will  be  brought  here  for 
sale.  The  more  people  come  here,  the  more  land  will  be  required.  The 
larger  and  more  valuable  the  freights  homeward,  the  less  will  be  the  cost  of 
freight  outward,  and  the  more  numerous  will  be  the  commodities  that  can 
be  exported  to  pay  for  those  we  may  choose  to  import. 

Were  we  now  importing  a  million  of  men  annually,  the  sales  of  land  would 
soon  reach  ten  millions  of  acres  per  annum.  That  point  we  should  now  reach 
in  five  years  of  perfect  and  fixed  protection,  and  but  few  more  years  would 
be  required  to  double  both  the  importation  of  men  and  the  sales  of  public 
lands.  Here  is  a  vast  source  of  public  revenue. 

Perfect  protection  would,  by  degrees,  diminish  the  import  of  cottons,  iron, 


THE   HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS.  221 

and  other  duty-paying  goods,  but  we  should  consume  treble  or  quadruple  the 
quantity  of  coffee,  tea,  and  the  raw  materials  for  the  production  of  which  the 
soil  or  climate  of  the  country  is  not  suited,  and  thus  should  we  raise  the 
value  of  labour  employed  in  agriculture  throughout  the  world. 

It  is  asked,  "If  we  converted  all  our  cotton  into  cloth,  what  would  Europe 
produce  to  pay  us  for  it  ?"  In  answer,  it  may  be  said  that  the  object  of  pro- 
tection is  that  of  enabling  the  consumer  of  food  to  take  his  place  by  the  side 
of  the  producer  of  food,  not  to  separate  them.  It  is  to  our  interest  that  tile 
people  of  England  should  supply  themselves  with  clothing  made  by  men  who 
eat  the  food  of  England,  and  that  such  should  be  the  case  with  those  of  Ger- 
many and  Russia,  Spain  and  Italy,  and  with  every  step  in  their  progress  they 
would  need  more  cotton.  To  pay  for  it,  they  would  employ  their  labour  in  the 
pi-oduction  of  thousands  of  articles  of  taste  and  luxury,  of  which  we  should 
then  consume  immense  quantities,  and  therewith  there  would  be  improvement 
of  taste,  refinement  of  feeling,  elevation  of  character,  and  increase  of  indi- 
vidual and  national  strength,  of  which  now  we  can  form  no  conception. 

Upon  such  commodities  the  duties  would  be  moderate,  and,  as  the  imports 
of  the  more  bulky  of  the  duty-paying  articles  diminished,  the  customs' 
revenue  would  gradually  decline,  until  at  length  the  necessity  for  custom-houses 
would  pass  away,  the  power  to  maintain  government  with  the  land  revenue 
having  grown  to  take  its  place,  and  thus  might  be  realized  the  wonderful 
idea  of  the  government  of  an  immense  nation  maintained  without  the  neces- 
sity for  a  single  man  employed  in  the  collection  of  taxes. 

It  would  thus  appear  that  between  the  interests  of  the  treasury  and  the 
people,  the  farmer,  planter,  manufacturer,  and  merchant,  the  great  and  little 
trader  and  the  shipowner,  the  slave-  and  his  master,  the  landowners  and  la- 
bourers of  the  Union  and  the  world,  the  free  trader  and  the  advocate  of 
protection,  there  is  perfect  harmony  of  interests,  and  that  the  way  to  the 
?sta':lishinent  of  universal  peace  and  universal  free  trade,  is  to  be  found  in 
the  adoption  of  measures  tending  to  the  destruction  of  the  monopoly  of  ma- 
chinery, and  the  location  of  the  loom  and  the  anvil  in  the  vicinity  of  the 
plough  and  the  harrow. 

CHAPTER  TWENTY-SIXTH. 
HOW  PROTECTION  AFFECTS   THE  GOVERNMENT. 

THE  man  whose  labour  is  productive,  and  whose  habits  are  economical, 
.snjoys  the  confidence  of  the  world ;  while  he  whose  labour  is  unproductive, 
and  whose  habits  are  wasteful,  is  looked  upon  with  distrust.  With  the  one, 
each  day  is  marked  by  an  increase  of  strength ;  while  with  the  other  it  is 
marked  by  an  increase  of  weakness. 

So  is  it  with  communities.  The  peaceful  and  industrious  grow  rich  and 
strong.  The  warlike  and  wasteful  become  poor  and  weak. 

If  protection  be  "  a  war  upon  the  labour  and  capital  of  the  world,"  it  must 
tend  to  cause  diminution  of  wealth  and  strength,  and  the  monopoly  system  of 
England  must  tend  to  the  augmentation  of  both. 

At  no  anterior  period  had  the  wealth  and  strength  of  this  country  grown 
with  the  rapidity  with  which  it  grew  from  1830  to  1835.  The  nation  was  at 
peace  and  all  were  employed.  At  no  period  has  decline  been  so  obvious,  or 
the  descent  more  complete  than  in  the  period  which  followed.  The  nation 
was  at  war,  and  production  declined  until  in  many  departments  of  industry 
it  almost  ceased.  The  name  of  America  became  almost  a  by-word  for  weak- 
ness and  want  of  faith.  In  the  four  succeeding  years,  the  recovery  was  such 
as  to  be  almost  marvellous,  and  then  it  was  that  the  power  of  the  nation  first 
began  to  be  admitted.  That  period  has  been  followed  by  one  of  war  and  waste, 


222  THE   HARMONY  OF  INTERESTS. 


and  largely  increased  expenditure,  rendering  necessary  the  collection  of  large 
revenues,  while  production  is  diminishing.  The  people  and  the  government 
are  now  living  on  borrowed  money,  and  how  long  they  can  continue  to  borrow 
is  uncertain.  The  revenue  from  customs  in  the  vear  ending  in  June  last 

was •  $28,436,000 

Of  which  there  was  collected  on  goods  purchased  with  certifi- 
cates of  debt    ...  6,600,000 

To  meet  the  demands  of  the  government  for  the  present  year,  the  whole 
sum  of  $28, 000, 000  would  be  required,  and,  if  we  should  cease  to  be  able 
to  purchase  merchandise  on  credit,  the  government  would  be  driven  again 
to  the  raising  of  money  by  means  of  loans,  and  if  at  the  same  time  the  debts 
now  being  created  were  sent  back  upon  us  for  payment,  the  present  year 
might  witness  a  repetition  of  the  troubles  of  1841  and  1842. 

During  the  existence  of  the  tariff  of  1842,  the  government  paid  its  way, 
and  therefore  it  was  strong.  It  is  now  carried  on  on  credit,  and  therefore  it  is 
becoming  weak.  To  the  extent  of  the  foreign  debt  created,  the  country  has 
eaten  and  drunk  and  used  that  for  which  it  has  yet  to  pay,  and  the  govern- 
ment has  had  its  thirty  per  cent. ;  but  a  demand  for  payment  would  at  once 
reduce  the  imports  as  much  below  the  exports  as  they  now  exceed  them,  and 
the  government  would  find  its  revenue  decreased  to  the  full  extent  of  the 
present  excess. 

The  contrast  presented,  on  a  review  of  the  history  of  Great  Britain  and 
this  country,  is  most  instructive.  Sixty  years  since,  the  former  was  rich  and 
populous,  while  the  latter  was  poor  and  its  population  was  small  and  widely 
scattered.  In  wealth,  the  Union  already  exceeds  her  competitor,  and  in 
population  it  will  do  so  at  the  close  of  the  next  decennial  period. 

The  reason  of  this  is  to  be  found  in  the  fact,  that  the  policy  of  the  one 
has  tended  to  the  separation  of  the  consumer  from  the  producer,  while  that  of 
the  other  has,  to  some  extent,  tended  towards  bringing  them  together.  The 
English  system  is  based  upon  "  ships,  colonies,  and  commerce,"  and.  in  carry- 
ing it  out,  her  colonies  have  been  in  succession  exhausted.  Ireland  now  lies 
prostrate  and  helpless — a  burden  upon  her  hands — an  encumbrance  rather  than 
an  advantage.  Poverty  and  distress  are  coming  gradually  nearer  and  nearer 
home,  while  she  is  encumbered  with  an  enormous  debt,  no  part  of  which  can 
she  pay,  and  the  interest  upon  which  is  yet  paid  only  by  aid  of  a  series  of 
repudiations  quite  as  discreditable  as  those  with  which  she  is  accustomed  to 
charge  upon  Mississippi  and  Florida.* 

The  American  system  is  based  upon  agriculture,  the  work  of  production, 
and  its  object  has  been  that  of  producing  prosperous  agriculture,  by  bringing 
the  consumer  to  take  his  place  by  the  side  of  the  producer,  and  thus  es- 
tablishing that  great  commerce  which  is  performed  without  the  aid  of  ships 
or  wagons.  By  aid  of  that  system  the  original  thirteen  States  have  planted 
numerous  colonies,  all  of  which  have  grown  and  thriven,  giving  and  receiving 
strength,  while  those  of  England,  so  long  the  subjects  of  immense  taxation, 
are  now  everywhere  a  cause  of  weakness.  All  desire  to  abandon  her,  while 
all  would  desire  to  unite  with  us,  and  were  they  at  liberty  to  exercise  their 

*  The  great  expansion  of  the  Bank  of  England  in  1839,  was  followed  by  the  destruc- 
tion of  confidence  among  individuals  to  so  great  an  extent  that  the  three  per  cents  went 
up  to  par,  and  the  government  availed  itself  of  the  opportunity  to  compel  the  holders  of 
the  four  and  a  half  per  cents  to  take  in  exchange  new  certificates,  bearing  three  and  a 
half  per  cent  Shortly  after  the  threes  fell  to  eighty.  The  last  expansion  has  brought 
about  a  similar  state  of  things.  Confidence  is  destroyed,  and  trade  is  paralyzed,  and  the 
threes  are  again  almost  at  par ;  and  it  is  now  suggested  that  a  new  arrangement  may  be 
made  by  which  the  government  may  be  enabled  to  repudiate  a  further  portion  of  the  inte« 
rest  on  the  debt 


THE   HARMONY   OF    INTERESTS.  223 

inclinations,  the  sway  of  the  Queen  of  Great  Britain  would,  probably,  at  tho 
close  of  the  present  year,  be  limited  to  that  island  alone,  with  its  twenty  or 
twenty-two  millions  of  inhabitants. 

The  free,  trade  of  England  consists  in  the  maintenance  of  monopoly,  and 
therefore  is  it  repulsive.  The  protective  system  of  this  country  looks  to  the 
breaking  down  of  monopoly,  and  the  establishment  of  perfect  free  trade,  and 
therefore  is  it  attractive. 

The  one  looks  to  "  cheap"  labour,  and  therefore  does  it  expel  individuals 
as  well  as  communities.  The  other  looks  to  raising  the  value  of  labour,  and 
therefore  does  it  attract  both  individuals  and  communities. 

Protection  tends  to  the  maintenance  of  peace,  and  the  increase  of  wealth 
and  power.  The  colonial  system  tends  to  the  production  of  causes  of  war, 
and  ths  diminution  and  ultimate  destruction  of  both  wealth  and  power. 

Between  the  views  of  those  who  would  desire  to  see  their  government 
strong  for  defending  them  in  the  enjoyment  of  all  their  rights  in  relation  to 
the  other  communities  of  the  world,  and  those  of  others  who  desire  to  see 
the  government  peacefully  and  economically  administered,  there  is  therefore 
perfect  harmony. 


CHAPTEE  TWENTY-SEVENTH. 
HOW  PROTECTION   AFFECTS   THE   NATION. 

THE  man  whose  labour  is  productive,  exercises  the  power  of  self-govern- 
ment, which  increases  with  every  increase  in  the  productiveness  of  his 
labour.  With  every  diminution  in  his  power  of  production,  ho  loses  more 
and  more  the  power  of  self-government,  and  ultimately  becomes  a  slave.* 

So  is  it  with  nations.  With  every  increase  in  the  productiveness  of  their  labour, 
they  are  more  enabled  to  determine  for  themselves  their  own  course  of  action, 
uninfluenced  by  that  of  surrounding  nations.  With  every  diminution  therein, 
they  are  more  and  more  compelled  to  shape  their  course  of  action  by  that  of 
others,  losing  the  power  of  self-government. 

With  the  diminished  necessity  for  combination  with  their  neighbours,  there 
is  an  increased  power  for  voluntary  combination,  (annexation,)  tending  still 
further  to  increase  the  return  to  labour.  With  increased  necessity  for  com- 
bination, there  is  diminished  power  for  voluntary  combination,  with  diminished 
return  to  labour. 

If  protection  be  "  a  war  upon  labour  and  capital,"  it  must  diminish  the 
power  of  voluntary  union,  and  increase  the  necessity  for  uniting  our  efforts 
with  those  of  distant  nations.  If  the  English  monopoly  system  tend  to  in- 
crease the  value  of  labour  and  capital,  it  must  tend  to  increase  the  power 
of  voluntary  union,  and  diminish  the  necessity  for  involuntary  union. 

Of  all  the  nations  of  the  world,  there  is,  at  the  present  time,  not  one  that 
exercises  in  a  less  degree  the  power  of  self-government  than  that  of  Great 
Britain.  For  the  last  thirty  years,  her  policy  has  been  dictated  by  others. 
The  repeal  of  the  laws  prohibiting  the  export  of  machinery  was  a  matter  of 
necessity,  and  so  have  been.,  in  succession,  all  the  laws  relative  to  duties  on 
imports.  The  duty  on  cotton  was  abolished  because  other  nations  had  ob- 
tained machinery.  Slave-grown  cotton  was  admitted  duty  free,  while  slave- 
grown  sugar  was  subjected  to  heavy  duties,  because  a  supply  of  cotton  was 


*  "The  transition  from  absolute  freedom  to  a  state  of  slavery  is  now  in  progress  among 
the  Arabs  of  Mesopotamia,  owing  to  diminished  power  of  obtaining  the  means  of  sub- 
sistence by  the  modes  heretofore  pursued.  The  poor  and  the  weak  aie  enslaved  b/ 
those  who  are  stronger  and  more  wealthy." — Spectator,  March,  1840. 


224  THE   HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS. 

matter  of  necessity.  The  restrictions  on  slave-grown  sugar  were  abandoned, 
because  the  abandonment  was  necessary.  The  navigation  laws  have,  step  by 
step,  been  abandoned,  as  matter  of  necessity.  The  corn  laws  were  repealed 
because  it  was  deemed  necessary  to  conciliate  the  growers  of  corn  into  be- 
coming large  purchasers  of  cloth  and  iron.  With  each  step  in  her  progress, 
pauperism  and  crime  increase,  and  the  necessity  for  places  of  banishment 
for  criminals  increases,  and  with  each  there  is  increased  difficulty  in  finding 
places  willing  to  receive  them.  Having  exhausted  Van  Diemen's  land,*  and 
Norfolk  Island,  the  Cape  was  recently  selected  for  the  purpose,  but  the 
colonists  have  set  an  example  of  successful  resistance  that  will  be  elsewhere 
followed.  Canada  is  now  to  be  set  free,  and  Ireland  is  to  be  retained,  neither 
of  them  of  choice,  but  both  as  matters  of  necessity.  The  nation  has  lost  the 
power  of  self-government.  Its  policy  is  being  dictated  to  it  by  the  other 
nations  of  the  world.  The  tendency  to  voluntary  union  has  ceased  to  exist, 
and  each  day  brings  with  it  new  evidence  that  the  dissolution  of  the  British 
empire  is  at  hand. 

If  such  is  the  case  with  the  owners  of  the  loom  and  the  anvil,  how  is  it 
with  their  subjects  who  hold  the  plough  and  follow  the  harrow  ?  Ireland 
has  no  power  of  self-government.  She  is  a  mere  machine  in  the  hands  of 
those  who  perform  the  duties  of  government.  Poor-laws  are  inflicted  upon 
her  to  such  an  extent  as  almost  to  amount  to  a  confiscation  of  property,  and 
then  other  laws  are  passed  to  authorize  commissioners  to  take  possession  of, 
and  sell,  a  large  portion  of  the  property  of  the  kingdom,  thus  encumbered. 

The  West  Indies  were  gradually  exhausted  under  the  system,  and  their 
people  despoiled  of  their  property  by  virtue  of  laws  passed  by  men  who 
paid  no  portion  of  the  enormous  loss  thus  inflicted  upon  their  fellow-subjects. 
The  people  of  Canada  have  had  new  systems  inflicted  upon  them  with  a 
view  to  the  maintenance  of  peace,  but  peace  there  is  none.  All  desire  to 
obtain  the  right  of  self-government,  the  first  step  in  which  will  be  resistance 
to  the  monopoly  system. 

Of  all  the  colonies  of  England,  the  only  one  that  has  prospered  is  this 
Union,  and  it  has  so  done,  because  it  has,  in  a  certain  degree,  exercised  the 
power  of  self-government,  manifested  by  a  determination  to  bring  the  loom 
and  the  anvil  to  take  their  natural  places  by  the  side  of  the  plough  and  the 
harrow.  Hence  it  is  that  every  colony  of  Great  Britain,  Ireland  included, 
desires  annexation  to  us  and  separation  from  her.  The  tendency  to  voluntary 
union  exists  in  a  degree  exceeding  any  thing  that  the  world  has  yet  seen. 
Nevertheless,  we  are  yet  Tjut  little  more  than  a  colony.  Our  people  have  DO 
control  over  their  own  actions.  They  are  almost  as  dependent  upon  the  will 
of  those  who  now  desire,  though  vainly,  to  guide  the  movements  of  England, 
as  are  those  of  Canada. 

If  the  people  of  that  country  determine  to  make  railroads,  iron  rises  in 
price,  and  we  build  furnaces  and  open  coal  mines,  and  import  people  to  make 
iron  and  mine  coal.  If  they  cease  to  make  roads,  we  shut  up  our  furnaces 


*  «  Thither  nearly  the  whole  convict  population  of  Great  Britain  and  Ireland,  about  3500 
annually  in  number,  were  sent  for  several  years.  *  *  The  consequence  was,  that  ere 
long  three-fifths  of  the  inhabitants  of  the  colony  were  convicts.  *  *  The  morals  of  the 
settlement,  thus  having  a  majority  of  convicts,  were  essentially  injured.  Crimes  unut- 
terable were  committed  ;  the  hideous  inequality  of  the  sexes  induced  its  usual  and 
frightful  disorders;  the  police,  how  severe  and  vigilant  soever,  became  unable  to  coerce 
the  rapidly  increasing  multitude  of  criminals;  the  most  daring  fled  to  the  woods,  where 
they  became  bush-rangers;  life  became  insecure,  and  property  sank  to  half  its  former 
Talue." — BlackwoocTs  Magazine,  November,  1819.  «  At  present,  there  are,  or  at  least  should 
be,  above  5000  criminals  annually  transported  from  the  British  Islands." — Ibid. 


THE   HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS.  225 

and  mines,  and  then  the  iron  men  and  the  coal  men  have  to  endeavour  to  raise 
food.  If  they  ask  a  high  price  for  cloth,  we  build  mills.  If  employment  be- 
come scarce  with  them,  and  their  people  cease  to  consume  cloth,  we  close  our 
mills,  and  our  operatives  are  condemned  to  idleness.  If  the  Bank  of  England 
make  money  cheap,  we  buy  iron  and  cloth  on  credit ;  if  it  make  it  dear,  we 
are  called  upon  for  payment,  and  then  we  break.  If  employment  for  capital 
be  denied  at  home,  our  houses  and  lands  rise  in  price ;  if  capital  become 
scarce,  our  houses  and  lands  fall  in  value.  If  we  build  mills  ami  furnaces, 
our  people  stay  at  home ;  if  we  close  them,  they  scatter  abroad.  If  money 
be  cheap  in  England,  our  government  obtains  a  large  revenue  from  duties  on 
the  goods  that  are  bought  on  credit ;  if  it  be  dear,  the  revenue  falls  off,  and 
the  government  begs  for  loans  in  Europe.  The  value  of  every  thing,  and 
the  movement  of  every  thing,  in  this  country,  are  settled  by  the  movement 
of  the  Bank  of  England,  of  all  the  large  institutions  of  the  world  the  one 
in  the  government  of  which  there  is  manifested  the  least  capacity;  and  the 
one,  consequently,  that  possesses  in  the  smallest  degree  the  power  of  self- 
government.  Four  times  in  thirty  years  has  it  been  on  the  verge  of  bank- 
ruptcy, and  yet  to  its  car  and  that  of  the  government  of  England,  now 
floundering  in  a  sea  of  troubles,  is  this  Union  attached  by  aid  of  the  system 
now  known  by  the  name  of  free  trade. 

For  thus  relinquishing  the  power  of  self-government,  there  should  be  a 
large  consideration ;  yet  all  that  we  receive  from  Europe  in  return  for  all  we 
send  her  is  fifty  cents'  worth  of  iron,  half  a  pound  of  wool,  as  much  flax,  &a 
ounce  or  two  of  silk,  a  cup  and  saucer,  and  the  weaving  and  twisting  of  a  pound 
and  a  half  of  cotton,  per  head,  all  of  which  could  be  produced  or  performed 
here  by  fewer  people  than  have  come  here  in  a  single  year,  when  we  have  made 
a  market  for  their  labour.  Half  a  million  of  people  would  produce  treble  the 
•flax,  the  wool,  the  silk,  and  the  iron,  the  china-ware,  and  spin  and  weave  treble 
the  quantity  of  silk,  wool,  flax,  and  cotton,  that  we  receive  from  Europe  in  re- 
turn for  all  the  land  and  labour  employed  in  producing  the  cotton,  tobacco,  rice, 
grain,  butter,  cheese,  pork,  and  other  commodities  that  we  send  to  that  quar- 
ter of  the  world ;  and  that  half  million  would  consume  almost  as  much  cot- 
ton as  is  now  consumed  by  all  the  people  of  Ireland,  besides  being  cus- 
tomers to  the  farmer  for  fifty  millions  of  dollars'  worth  of  food,  timber,  and 
other  of  the  products  of  the  soil.  We  thus  relinquish  the  power  of  self- 
government,  not  only  without  receiving  an  equivalent,  but  we  give  our  pro- 
perty without  an  equivalent,  and  therefore  it  is  that  the  farmers  and  planters 
of  the  Union  remain  poor  when  they  might  become  rich. 

Rich  they  would  grow,  for  the  people  thus  imported  would  require  a  vast 
amount  of  shipping,  and  cotton,  rice,  and  tobacco  would  go  cheaply  abroad, 
while  a  vast  consumption  at  home  would  maintain  the  price,  and  both  farmer 
and  planter  would  be  enabled  to  consume  more  largely  of  coffee,  tea,  silks, 
books,  pictures,  gold,  silver,  and  all  other  articles  of  necessity  or  luxury  not 
produced  at  home,  and  the  producers  of  those  commodities  would  consume 
more  cloth  and  iron,  both  of  which  we  should  then  produce  so  cheaply  that 
we  could  send  them  abroad,  and  thus  would  come  wealth  and  prosperity, 
happiness  and  independence.  

To  the  consciousness  of  the  necessity  for  protection  against  the  monopoly 
system  was  due  the  state  of  feeling  that  led  to  the  Revolution.  Resistance 
to  oppression  led,  on  various  occasions,  to  non-importation  resolutions,  and 
the  people  were  everywhere  urged  to  endeavour  to  clothe  themselves.  The 
necessity  for  protection  was  recognised  by  the  early  Congresses,  and  its  im- 
portance urged  upon  them  by  every  administration. 

Fifty  years  since,  power  changed  hands ;  but  with  the  accession  of  Mr. 


'220  THE   HARMOXY   OF   IXTERESTS. 


Jefferson  came  no  change  of  policy.  He  thought  "  the  manufacturer  should 
take  his  place  by  the  side  of  the  agriculturist."  From  that  time,  for  a  period 
of  thirty-six  years,  every  chief  magistrate,  elected  by  the  people,  was  from  the 
planting  States  of  the  Union,  and  all  of  them  elected  by  the  same  party 
that  elected  Mr.  Jefferson,  and  each  and  every  one  of  them  was  an  advocate 
of  the  system  which  tended  to  bring  the  loom  to  the  neighbourhood  of  the 
plough,  and  thus  to  make  a  market  on  the  land  for  the  products  of  the  land. 
By  the  last  of  these,  his  views  on  this  subject  were  forcibly  expressed  in  a 
letter  that  has  frequently  been  published,  and  from  which  the  following  is  an 
extract : 

"I  will  ask,  what  is  the  real  situation  of  the  agriculturist?  Where  has  the  American 
farmer  a  market  for  his  surplus  produce?  Except  for  cotton,  he  has  neither  a  foreign 
nor  home  market.  Does  not  this  clearly  prove,  when  there  is  no  market  either  at  home 
or  abroad,  that  there  is  too  much  labour  employed  in  agriculture,  and  that  the  channels 
for  labour  should  be  multiplied  ?  Common  sense  points  out  at  once  the  remedy ;  draw  from 
agriculture  this  superabundant  labour,  employ  it  in  mechanism  and  manufactures, 
thereby  creating  a  home  market  for  your  breadstuffs,  and  distributing  labour  to  the  most 
profitable  account,  and  benefits  to  the  country  will  result.  Take  from  agriculture  in  the 
United  States  six  hundred  thousand  men,  women,  and  children,  and  you  will  at  once  give 
a  home  market  for  more  breadstuffs  than  all  Europe  <jow  furnishes  us.  In  short,  sir,  we 
have  been  too  long  subject  to  the  policy  of  British  merchants.  It  is  true  that  we  should 
become  a  little  more  Americanized,  and,  instead  of  feeding  the  paupers  and  labourers 
of  England,  [as  we  do  by  sending  there  for  her  manufactures,]  feed  our  own ;  or  else, 
in  a  short  time,  by  continuing  our  present  [free  trade]  policy,  we  shall  all  be  rendered 
paupers  ourselves." — President  Jackson. 

At  the  close  of  that  period  there  was  a  change  of  policy.  Elected  bj  the 
same  party  that  had  elected  his  predecessor,  Mr.  Van  Buren  adopted  the 
policy  which  tends  to  the  separation  of  the  consumer  from  the  producer,  to 
the  impoverishment  of  the  land  and  its  owner,  and  the  maintenance  of  thj 
monopoly  system  by  which  England  had  acquired  the  control  of  ..the  move- 
ments of  the  world.  The  effects  were  disastrous,  as  may  be  seen  by  all  who 
study  the  diagrams  given  in  the  third  chapter,  and  the  consequence  was  a  po- 
litical revolution.  For  the  first  time  in  forty  years,  a  president  was  elected 
by  the  people  not  being  of  the  party  generally  known  as  that  of  the  Demo 
crats.  Democracy  had  changed  sides,  and  the  people  did  not  go  with  it 
The  consequence  of  this  was,  nearly  two  years  later,  a  return  to  the  polic} 
of  protection  and  a  restoration  of  prosperity,  and  with  prosperity  the  party 
that  had  so  long  controlled  the  movements  of  the  country  was  again  restored 
to  power.  Unwilling,  however,  to  acknowledge  that  the  revolution  of  1840  had 
been  the  consequence  of  an  error  of  policy,  they  ascribed  it  to  various  minor 
and  insignificant  causes,  and  proceeded  to  the  enaction  of  the  tariff  of  1846, 
and  the  consequence  was  another  revolution  by  which  the  party  of  protec- 
tion was  again  restored  to  power.  Like  the  former,  that  revolution  is  now 
ascribed  to  minor  causes;  but  those  who  will  study  the  diagrams  to  which 
I  have  above  referred  can  scarcely  fail  to  see  that  it  was  due  to  the  fact 
that  the  party  styled  Democratic  had  espoused  a  course  of  policy  that 
tended  to  diminish  the  value  of  labour,  to  degrade  the  labourer,  to  de- 
press the  democracy  at  home,  and  to  maintain  the  aristocracy  abroad; 
nor  can  they,  as  I  think,  fail  to  arrive  at  the  belief  that  no  party  adverse 
to  protection  can  again  hold  power  in  this  country.  Such  being  the 
case,  the  interest  of  both  parties,  if  actuated  solely  by  purely  selfish  consi- 
derations, would  lead  to  the  advocacy  of  the  same  course  of  policy — the  one 
in  power  desiring  that  it  might  not  be  adopted,  and  that  thus  they  might 
profit  by  the  agitation  of  the  question  for  maintaining  themselves  in  autho- 
rity, and  the  one  out  of  power,  that  it  might  be  settled,  and  the  agitation  of 
th-3  question  brought  to  a  close. 


THE   HARMONY  OF   INTERESTS.  227 


CONCLUSION. 

MUCH  is  said  of  "  the  mission"  of  the  people  of  these  United  States,  and 
most  of  it  is  said  by  persons  who  appear  to  limit  themselves  to  the  considera- 
tion of  the  powers  of  the  nation,  and  rarely  to  think  of  its  duties.  By  such 
men  the  grandeur  of  the  national  position  is  held  to  be  greatly  increased  by 
having  expended  sixty  or  eighty  millions  upon  a  war  with  a  weak  neighbour, 
and  having  thus  acquired  the  power  to  purchase,  at  a  high  price,  a  vast  body 
of  wild  land  that  would,  in  the  natural  course  of  events,  have  been  brought 
within  the  Union,  in  reasonable  time,  without  the  cost  of  a  dollar  or  a  life. 
By  such  men,  the  fitting  out  of  expeditions  for  the  purpose  of  producing  civil 
war  among  our  neighbours  of  Cuba,  is  held  to  be  another  evidence  of  gran- 
deur. Others  would  have  us  to  mix  ourselves  up  with  all  the  revolutionists 
of  Europe  j  while  a  fourth  and  last  set  sigh  at  the  reflection  that  our  fleets 
and  armies  are  too  small  for  the  magnificence  of  our  position. 

By  some  it  is  supposed  that  our  "  mission"  is  that  of  monopolizing  the 
commerce  of  the  world,  and  the  time  is  anxiously  looked  for  when  we  shall 
have  "  diplomatic  relations"  with  "  vast  regions  of  the  East,"  Persia,  Corea, 
Cochin-China,  Burmah  and  Japan,  with  whom  "  nothing  but  the  steam-ship 
can  successfully  introduce  our  commerce."  By  "  persevering  and  successful 
efforts,"  it  is  thought  we  may  secure  the  "  commerce  of  Japan."  That  done, 

"  New  York,"  it  is  thought,  «  would  become  the  depot  and  storehouse  and  entrepots  of  the 
world,  the  centre  of  business  and  exchanges,  the  clearing  house  of  international  trade  and 
business,  the  place  where  assorted  cargoes  of  our  own  products  and  manufactures,  as  well 
as  those  of  all  foreign  countries,  would  be  sold  and  reshipped,  and  the  point  to  which 
specie  and  bullion  would  flow,  as  the  great  creditor  city  of  the  world  for  the  adjustment 
of  balances,  as  the  factor  of  all  nations  and"  the  point  whence  this  specie  would  flow  into 
the  interior  of  our  country  through  all  the  great  channels  of  international  trade  and  inter- 
course. With  these  great  events  accomplished,  and  with  abundant  facilities  for  the  ware- 
housing of  foreign  and  domestic  goods  at  New  York,  it  must  eventually  surpass  in  wealth 
in  commerce,  and  population,  any  European  emporium,  whilst,  as  a  necessary  consequence, 
all  our  other  cities  and  every  portion  of  the  Union  and  all  our  great  interests,  would  de- 
rive corresponding  advantages." — Treasury  Report,  December,  1848. 

The  cost  of  a  mission  to  Japan  would  build  half  a  dozen  furnaces  that 
would  add  more  to  the  wealth  of  the  nation  in  five  years  than  the  commerce 
of  that  country  would  do  in  half  a  century.  The  amount  we  have  expended 
on  the  mission  to  Austria,  in  search  of  a  market  for  tobacco,  would  bring 
here  as  many  Germans  as  would  consume  almost  as  much  of  our  tobacco  as 
is  now  consumed  in  the  empire,  and  those  tobacco  consumers  would  do  more 
for  the  growth,  of  New  York  than  either  Japan  or  Austria. 

The  English  doctrine  of  "  ships,  colonies,  and  commerce"  is  thus  reproduced 
on  this  sid-e  of  the  Atlantic,  and  its  adoption  by  the  nation  would  be  fol- 
lowed by  effects  similar  to  those  which  have  been  already  described  as  exist- 
ing in  England.  There,  for  a  time,  it  gave  the  power  to  tax  the  world  for  the 
maintenance  of  fleets  and  armies,  as  had  before  been  done  by  Athens  and 
by  Rome,  and  there  it  is  now  producing  the  same  results  that  have  elsewhere 
resulted  from  the  same  system,  poverty,  depopulation,  exhaustion,  and  weak- 
ness. 

But  little  study  of  our  history  is  required  to  satisfy  the  inquirer  that  the 
power  of  the  Union,  and  its  magnificent  position  among  the  nations  of  the 
earth,  are  due  to  the  fact  that  we  have  to  so  great  an  extent  abstained  from 
measures  requiring  the  maintenance  of  fleets  and  armies.  The  consequence 
has  been  that  taxes  have  been  light,  capital  has  accumulated  rapidly,  labour 


228  THE   HARMONY   OF   INTERESTS. 


has  been  productive,  and  the  labourer  has  received  wages  that  have  enabled 
him  to  feed,  clothe,  and  educate  his  children,  and  the  nation  has  thus  per- 
formed its  true  "  mission"  m  elevating  the  condition  of  man.  If  we  desire 
to  find  exceptions  to  this,  we  must  look  to  those  periods  in  which  the  policy 
of  Washington,  Jefferson,  Madison,  Monroe,  and  Jackson,  was  departed  from, 
and  when  the  government  adopted  measures  tending  to  the  maintenance 
of  the  English  monopoly  of  machinery,  and  there  we  shall  find  taxes  more 
heavy,  capital  accumulating  more  slowly,  labour  more  unproductive,  and  the 
wages  of  labour  so  much  depressed  that  the  labourer  finds  it  difficult  to  feed 
or  clothe  his  children,  and  still  more  difficult  to  educate  them. 

Two  systems  are  before  the  world ;  the  one  looks  to  increasing  the  propor- 
tion of  persons  and  of  capital  engaged  in  trade  and  transportation,  and  therefore 
to  diminishing  the  proportion  engaged  in  producing  commodities  with  which  to 
trade,with  necessarily  diminished  return  to  the  labour  of  all;  while  the  other  looks 
to  increasing  the  proportion  engaged  in  the  work  of  production,  and  diminishing 
that  engaged  in  trade  and  transportation,  with  increased  return  to  all,  giving  to 
the  labourer  good  wages,  and  to  the  owner  of  capital  good  profits.  One  looks 
to  increasing  the  quantity  of  raw  materials  to  be  exported,  and  diminishing 
the  inducements  to  the  import  of  men,  thus  impoverishing  both  farmer  and 
planter  by  throwing  on  them  the  burden  of  freight;  while  the  other  looks  to 
increasing  the  import  of  men,  and  diminishing  the  export  of  raw  materials, 
thereby  enriching  both  planter  and  farmer  by  relieving  them  from  the  pay- 
ment of  freight.  One  looks  to  giving  the  products  of  millions  of  acres  of 
land  and  of  the  labour  of  millions  of  men  for  the  services  of  hundreds  of 
thousands  of  distant  men ;  the  other  to  bringing  the  distant  men  to  consume 
on  the  land  the  products  of  the  land,  exchanging  day's  labour  for  day's  la- 
bour. One  looks  to  compelling  the  farmers  and  planters  of  the  Union  to 
continue  their  contributions  for  the  support  of  the  fleets  and  the  armies,  the 
paupers,  the  nobles,  and  the  sovereigns  of  Europe ;  the  other  to  enabling  our- 
selves to  apply  the  same  means  to  the  moral  and  intellectual  improvement 
of  the  sovereigns  of  America.*  One  looks  to  the  continuance  of  that 
bastard  freedom  of  trade  which  denies  the  principle  of  protection,  yet  doles 
it  out  as  revenue  duties ;  the  other  to  extending  the  area  of  legitimate 
free  trade  by  the  establishment  of  perfect  protection,  followed  by  the 
annexation  of  individuals  and  communities,  and  ultimately  by  the  abo- 
lition of  custom-houses.  One  looks  to  exporting  men  to  occupy  desert 
tracts,  the  sovereignty  of  which  is  obtained  by  aid  of  diplomacy  or  war; 
the  other  to  increasing  the  value  of  an  immense  extent  of  vacant  land  by 
importing  men  by  millions  for  their  occupation.  One  looks  to  the  centrali- 
zation of  wealth  and  power  in  a  great  commercial  city  that  shall  rival  the 
great  cities  of  modern  times,  which  have  been  and  are  being  supported  by  aid 
of  contributions  which  have  exhausted  every  nation  subjected  to  them ;  the 
other  to  concentration,  by  aid  of  which  a  market  shall  be  made  upon  the 
land  for  the  products  of  the  land,  and  the  farmer  and  planter  be  enriched. 
One  looks  to  increasing  the  necessity  for  commerce ;  the  other  to  increasing 
the  power  to  maintain  it.  One  looks  to  underworking  the  Hindoo,  and  sink- 
ing the  rest  of  the  world  to  his  level;  the  other  to  raising  the  standard  of  man 
throughout  the  world  to  our  level.  One  looks  to  pauperism,  ignorance,  de- 
population, and  barbarism ;  the  other  to  increasing  wealth,  comfort,  intelligence, 
combination  of  action,  and  civilization.  One  looks  towards  universal  war; 
the  other  towards  universal  peace.  One  is  the  English  system ;  the  other  we 

•^  Russia  is  now  raising  by  loan  five  millions  of  pounds  sterling  to  pay  the  expense! 
of  the  war  in  Hungary.  The  farmers  and  planters  of  the  Union  are  the  chief  contri- 
butors to  this  loan 


THE   HARMONY  OF   INTERESTS.  229 

may  be  proud  to  call  the  American  system,  for  it  is  the  only  one  ever  de- 
vised the  tendency  of  which  was  that  of  ELEVATING  while  EQUALIZING  the 
condition  of  man  throughout  the  world. 

SUCH  is  the  true  MISSION  of  the  people  of  these  United  States.  To  them 
has  been  granted  a  privilege  never  before  granted  to  man,  that  of  the  exer- 
cise of  the  right  of  perfect  self-government  j  but,  as  rights  and  duties  are 
inseparable,  with  the  grant  of  the  former  came  the  obligation  to  perform  the 
latter.  Happily  their  performance  is  pleasant  and  profitable,  and  involves 
no  sacrifice.  To  raise  the  value  of  labour  throughout  the  world,  we  need 
only  to  raise  the  value  of  our  own.  To  raise  the  value  of  land  throughout 
the  world,  it  is  needed  only  that  we  adopt  measures  that  shall  raise  the  valno 
of  our  own.  To  diffuse  intelligence  and  to  promote  the  cause  of  morality 
throughout  the  world,  we  are  required  only  to  pursue  the  course  that  shall 
diffuse  education  throughout  our  own  land,  and  shall  enable  every  man  more 
readily  to  acquire  property,  and  with  it  respect  for  the  rights  of  property. 
To  improve  the  political  condition  of  man  throughout  the  world,  it  is  needed 
that  we  ourselves  should  remain  at  peace,  avoid  taxation  for  the  maintenance 
of  fleets  and  armies,  and  become  rich  and  prosperous.  To  raise  the  condition 
of  woman  throughout  the  world,  it  is  required  of  us  only  that  we  pursue 
that  course  that  enables  men  to  remain  at  home  and  marry,  that  they  may 
surround  themselves  with  happy  children  and  grand-children.  To  substitute 
true  Christianity  for  the  detestable  system  known  as  the  Malthusian,  it  is  needed 
that  we  prove  to  the  world  that  it  is  population  that  makes  the  food  come 
from  the  rich  soils,  and  that  food  tends  to  increase  more  rapidly  than  popula- 
tion, thus  vindicating  the  policy  of  God  to  man.  Doing  these  things,  the 
addition  to  our  population  by  immigration  will  speedily  rise  to  millions,  and 
with  each  and  every  year  the  desire  for  that  perfect  freedom  of  trade  which 
results  from  incorporation  within  the  Union,  will  be  seen  to  spread  and  to 
increase  in  its  intensity,  leading  gradually  to  the  establishment  of  an  empire  the 
most  extensive  and  magnificent  the  world  has  yet  seen,  based  upon  the  prin- 
ciples of  maintaining  peace  itself,  and  strong  enough  to  insist  upon  the  mainte- 
nance of  peace  by  others,  yet  carried  on  without  the  aid  of  fleets,  or  armies, 
or  taxes,  the  sales  of  public  lands  alone  sufficing  to  pay  the  expenses  of 
government. 

To  establish  such  an  empire — to  prove  that  among  the  people  of  the 
world,  whether  agriculturists,  manufacturers,  or  merchants,  there  is  perfect 
harmony  of  interests,  and  that  the  happiness  of  individuals,  as  well  as  the 
grandeur  of  nations,  is  to  be  promoted  by  perfect  obedience  to  that  greatest  of 
all  commands,  "  Do  unto  others  as  ye  would  that  others  should  do  unto  you," 
— is  the  object  and  will  be  the  result  of  that  mission.  Whether  that  result  shall 
be  speedily  attained,  or  whether  it  shall  be  postponed  to  a  distant  period, 
will  depend  greatly  upon  the  men  who  are  charged  with  the  performance  of 
the  duties  of  government.  If  their  movements  be  governed  by  that  enlight- 
ened self-interest  which  induces  man  to  seek  his  happiness  in  the  promotion 
of  that  of  his  fellow-man,  it  will  come  soon.  If,  on  the  contrary,  they  be 
governed  by  that  ignorant  selfishness  which  leads  to  the  belief  that  indivi- 
duals, party,  or  national  interests,  are  to  be  promoted  by  measures  tending 
to  the  deterioration  of  tL?  condition  of  others,  it  will  be  late. 


.THE  END. 


LETTERS 


INTERNATIONAL   COPYRIGHT 


BY 

H.    C.    CAREY, 

AUTHOR  OF   "  PRINCIPLES  OF   SOCIAL   SCIENCE,"   ETC.   ETC. 


SECOND  EDITION. 


NEW  YORK: 

PUBLISHED   BY  HURD  AND  HOUGHTON, 

459  BECOME  STREET. 
1868. 


PREFACE. 


AT  the  date,  now  fourteen  years  since,  of  the  first  publication 
of  these  letters,  the  important  case  of  authors  versus  readers  — 
makers  of  books  versus  consximers  of  facts  and  ideas  —  had  for 
several  years  been  again  on  trial  in  the  high  court  of  the  people. 
But  few  years  previously  the  same  plaintiffs  had  obtained  a  verdict 
giving  large  extension  of  time  to  the  monopoly  privileges  they  had 
so  long  enjoyed.  Not  content  therewith,  they  now  claimed  greater 
space,  desiring  to  have  those  privileges  so  extended  as  to  include 
within  their  domain  the  vast  population  of  the  British  Empire. 
To  that  hour  no  one  had  appeared  before  the  court  on  the  part 
of  the  defendants,  prepared  seriously  to  question  the  plaintiffs' 
assertion  to  the  effect  that  literary  property  stood  on  the  same 
precise  footing,  and  as  much  demanded  perpetual  and  universal 
recognition,  as  property  in  a  house,  a  mine,  a  farm,  or  a  ship.  As 
a  consequence  of  failure  in  this  respect  there  prevailed,  and  most 
especially  throughout  the  Eastern  States,  a  general  impression 
that  there  was  really  but  one  side  to  the  question ;  that  the 
cause  of  the  plaintiffs  was  that  of  truth  ;  that  in  the  past  might 
had  triumphed  over  right ;  that,  however  doubtful  might  be  the 
expediency  of  making  a  decree  to  that  effect,  there  could  be  lit- 
tle doubt  that  justice  would  thereby  be  done  ;  and  that,  while  re- 
jecting as  wholly  inexpedient  the  idea  of  perpetuity,  there  could 
be  but  slight  objection  to  so  far  recognizing  that  of  universality 
as  to  grant  to  British  authors  the  same  privileges  that  thus  far  had 
been  accorded  to  our  own. 

Throughout  those  years,  nevertheless,  the  effort  to  obtain  from  the 
legislative  authority  a  decree  to  that  effect  had  proved  an  utter  fail- 
ure. Time  and  again  had  the  case  been  up  for  trial,  but  as  often 
had  the  plaintiffs'  counsel  wholly  failed  to  agree  among  themselves 
as  to  the  consequences  that  might  reasonably  be  expected  to  result 


4  PREFACE. 

from  recognition  of  their  clients'  so-called  rights.  Northern  and 
Eastern  advocates,  representing  districts  in  which  schools  and  col- 
leges abounded,  insisted  that  perpetuity  and  universality  of  privi- 
lege must  result  in  giving  the  defendants  cheaper  books.  South- 
ern counsel,  on  the  contrary,  representing  districts  in  which  schools 
were  rare,  and  students  few  in  number,  insisted  that  extension  of 
privilege  would  have  the  effect  of  giving  to  planters  handsome 
editions  of  the  works  they  needed,  while  preventing  the  publi- 
cation of  "  cheap  and  nasty  "  editions,  fitted  for  the  "  mudsills  "  of 
Northern  States.  Failing  thus  to  agree  among  themselves  they 
failed  to  convince  the  jury,  mainly  representing,  as  it  did,  the 
Centre  and  the  "West,  as  a  consequence  of  which,  verdicts  favor- 
able to  the  defendants  had,  on  each  and  every  occasion,  been  ren- 
dered. 

A  thoroughly  adverse  popular  will  having  thus  been  manifested, 
it  was  now  determined  to  try  the  Senate,  and  here  the  chances 
for  privilege  were  better.  With  a  population  little  greater  than 
that  of  Pennsylvania,  the  New  England  States  had  six  times  the 
Senatorial  representation.  With  readers  not  a  fifth  as  numerous 
as  were  those  of  Ohio,  Carolina,  Florida,  and  Georgia  had  thrice 
the  number  of  Senators.  By  combining  these  heterogeneous  ele- 
ments the  will  of  the  people  —  so  frequently  and  decidedly  ex- 
pressed —  might,  it  was  thought,  be  set  aside.  To  that  end,  the 
Secretary  of  State,  himself  one  of  the  plaintiffs,  had  negotiated 
the  treaty  then  before  the  Senate,  of  the  terms  of  which  the  de- 
fendants had  been  kept  in  utter  ignorance,  and  by  means  of 
which  the  principle  of  taxation  without  representation  was  now  to 
be  established. 

Such  was  the  state  of  affairs  at  the  date  at  which,  in  compli- 
ance with  the  request  of  a  Pennsylvania  Senator,  the  author  of 
these  letters  put  on  paper  the  ideas  he  had  already  expressed  to  him 
in  conversation.  By  him  and  other  Senators  they  were  held  to  be 
conclusive,  so  conclusive  that  the  plaintiffs  were  speedily  brought 
to  see  that  the  path  of  safety,  for  the  present  at  least,  lay  in  the 
direction  of  abandoning  the  treaty  and  allowing  it  to  be  quietly 
laid  in  the  grave  in  which  it  since  has  rested.  That  such  should 
have  been  their  course  was,  at  the  time,  much  regretted  by 
the  defendants,  as  they  would  have  greatly  preferred  an  earnest 
and  thorough  discussion  of  the  question  before  the  court.  Had 
opportunity  been  afforded  it  would  have  been  discussed  by  one,  at 


PREFACE.  6 

least,  of  the  master  minds  of  the  Senate ; l  and  so  discussed  as  to 
have  satisfied  the  whole  body  of  our  people,  authors  and  editors, 
perhaps,  excepted,  that  their  cause  was  that  of  truth  and  justice  ; 
and  that  if  in  the  past  there  had  been  error  it  had  been  that  of 
excess  of  liberality  towards  the  plaintiffs  in  the  suit. 

The  issue  that  was  then  evaded  is  now  again  presented,  emi- 
nent counsel  having  been  employed,  and  the  opening  speech  hav- 
ing just  now  been  made.2  Having  read  it  carefully,  we  find  in  it, 
however,  nothing  beyond  a  labored  effort  at  reducing  the  literary 
profession  to  a  level  with  those  of  the  grocer  and  the  tallow-chan- 
dler. It  is  an  elaborate  reproduction  of  Oliver  Twist's  cry  for 
"  more  !  more !  "  —  a  new  edition  of  the  "  Beggar's  Petition,"  pe- 
rusal of  which  must,  as  we  think,  have  affected  with  profound  dis- 
gust many,  if  not  even  most,  of  the  eminent  persons  therein  re- 
ferred to.  In  it,  we  have  presented  for  consideration  the  sad  case 
of  one  distinguished  writer  and  admirable  man  who,  by  means  of 
his  pen  alone,  had  been  enabled  to  pass  through  a  long  life  of 
most  remarkable  enjoyment,  although  his  money  receipts  had,  by 
reason  of  the  alleged  injustice  of  the  consumers  of  his  products, 
but  little  exceeded  $200,000  ;  that  of  a  lady  writer  who,  by  means 
of  a  sensational  novel  of  great  merit  and  admirably  adapted  to  the 
modes  of  thought  of  the  hour,  had  been  enabled  to  earn  in  a  sin- 
gle year,  the  large  sum  of  $40,000,  though  still  deprived  of  two 
hundred  other  thousands  she  is  here  said  to  have  fairly  earned ; 
of  a  historian  whose  labors,  after  deducting  what  had  been  applied 
to  the  creation  of  a  most  valuable  library,  had  scarcely  yielded 
fifty  cents  per  day  ;  of  another  who  had  had  but  $1000  per  mouth  ; 
and,  passing  rapidly  from  the  sublime  to  the  ridiculous,  of  a  school 
copy-book  maker  who  had  seen  his  improvements  copied,  without 
compensation  to  himself,  for  the  benefit  of  English  children. 

These  may  and  perhaps  should  be  regarded  as  very  sad  facts  ; 
but  had  not  the  picture  a  brighter  side,  and  might  it  not  have  been 
well  for  the  eminent  counsel  to  have  presented  both  ?  Might  he 
not,  for  instance,  have  told  his  readers  that,  in  addition  to  the 
$200,000  above  referred  to,  and  wholly  as  acknowledgment  of  his 
literary  services,  the  eminent  recipient  had  for  many  years  en- 
joyed a  diplomatic  sinecure  of  the  highest  order,  by  means  of 
which  he  had  been  enabled  to  give  his  time  to  the  collection  of 
materials  for  his  most  important  works  ?  Might  he  not  have  fur- 
1  Senator  Clayton  of  Delaware.  2  See  Atlantic  Monthly  for  October. 


6  PREFACE. 

ther  told  us  how  other  of  the  distinguished  men  he  had  named, 
as  well  as  many  others  whose  names  had  not  been  given,  have, 
in  a  manner  precisely  similar,  been  rewarded  for  their  literary 
labors  ?  Might  he  not  have  said  something  of  the  pecuniary  and 
societary  successes  that  had  so  closely  followed  the  appearance 
of  the  novel  to  whose  publication  he  had  attributed  so  great  an 
influence  ?  Might  he  not,  and  with  great  propriety,  have  furnished 
an  extract  from  the  books  of  the  "  New  York  Ledger,"  exhibiting 
the  tens  and  hundreds  of  thousands  that  had  been  paid  for  articles 
which  few,  if  any,  would  care  to  read  a  second  time  ?  Might  he 
not  have  told  his  readers  of  the  excessive  earnings  of  public  lec- 
turers ?  Might  he  not,  too,  have  said  a  word  or  two  of  the  tricks 
and  contrivances  that  are  being  now  resorted  to  by  men  and 
women  —  highly  respectable  men  and  women  too  —  for  evading, 
on  both  sides  of  the  Atlantic,  the  spirit  of  the  copyright  laws 
while  complying  with  their  letter?  Would,  however,  such  a 
course  of  proceeding  have  answered  his  present  purpose  ?  Per- 
haps not !  His  business  was  to  pass  around  the  hat,  accompany- 
ing it  with  a  strong  appeal  to  the  charity  of  the  defendants,  and 
this,  so  far  as  we  can  see,  is  all  that  thus  far  has  been  done. 

Might  not,  however,  a  similar,  and  yet  stronger,  appeal  now  be 
made  in  behalf  of  other  of  the  public  servants  ?  At  the  close 
of  long  lives  devoted  to  the  public  service,  "Washington,  Hamilton, 
Clay,  Clayton,  and  many  other  of  our  most  eminent  men  have 
found  themselves  largely  losers,  not  gainers,  by  public  service. 
The  late  Governor  Andrew's  services  were  surely  worth  as 
much,  per  hour,  as  those  of  the  authoress  of  "  Uncle  Tom's  Cab- 
in," yet  did  he  give  five  years  of  his  life,  and  perhaps  his  life  it- 
self, for  far  less  than  half  of  what  she  had  received  for  the  labors 
of  a  single  one.  Deducting  the  expenses  incident  to  his  official 
life,  Mr.  Lincoln  would  have  been  required  to  labor  for  five  and 
twenty  years  before  he  could  have  received  as  much  as  was  paid  to 
the  author  of  the  "  Sketch  Book."  The  labors  of  the  historian 
of  Ferdinand  and  Isabella  have  been,  to  himself  and  his  family, 
ten  times  more  productive  than  have  been  those  of  Mr.  Stanton, 
the  great  war  minister  of  the  age.  —  Turning  now,  from  civil  to 
military  life,  we  see  among  ourselves  officers  who  have  but  re- 
cently rendered  the  largest  service,  but  who  are  now  quite  coolly 
whistled  down  the  wind,  to  find  where  they  can  the  means  of 
support  for  wives  and  children.  Studying  the  lists  of  honored 


PREFACE.  7 

dead,  we  find  therein  the  names  of  men  of  high  renown  whose 
widows  and  children  are  now  starving  on  pensions  whose  annual 
amount  is  less  than  the  monthly  receipt  of  any  one  of  the  authors 
above  referred  to. 

Such  being  the  facts,  and  that  they  are  facts  cannot  be  denied, 
let  us  now  suppose  a  proposition  to  be  made  that,  with  a  view  to 
add  one,  two,  three,  or  four  thousand  dollars  to  the  annual  income 
of  ex-presidents,  and  ex-legislators,  and  half  as  much  to  that  of 
the  widows  and  children  of  distinguished  officers,  there  should  be 
established  a  general  pension  system,  involving  an  expenditure  of 
the  public  moneys,  and  consequent  taxation,  to  the  extent  of  ten  or 
fifteen  millions  a  year,  and  then  inquire  by  whom  it  might  be  sup- 
ported. Would  any  single  one  of  the  editors  who  are  now  so  ear- 
nest in  their  appeals  for  further  grants  of  privilege  venture  so  to 
do  ?  Would  not  the  most  earnest  of  them  be  among  the  first  to 
visit  on  such  a  proposition  the  most  withering  denunciations  ? 
Judging  from  what,  in  the  last  two  years,  we  have  read  in  various 
editorial  columns,  we  should  say  that  they  would  be  so.  Would, 
however,  any  member  of  either  house  of  Congress  venture  to 
commit  himself  before  the  world  by  offering  such  a  proposi- 
tion? We  doubt  it  very  much.  Nevertheless  it  is  now  coolly 
proposed  to  establish  a  system  that  would  not  only  tax  the  present 
generation  as  many  millions  annually,  but  that  would  grow  in 
amount  at  a  rate  far  exceeding  the  growth  of  population,  doing 
this  in  the  hope  that  future  essayists  might  be  enabled  to  count 
their  receipts  by  half  instead  of  quarter  millions,  and  future  nov- 
elists to  collect  abroad  and  at  home  the  hundreds  of  thousands 
that,  as  we  are  assured,  are  theirs  of  right,  and  that  are  now  denied 
them.  When  we  shall  have  determined  to  grant  to  the  widows 
and  children  of  the  men  who  in  the  last  half  dozen  years  have 
perished  in  the  public  service,  some  slight  measure  of  justice,  it 
may  be  time  to  consider  that  question,  but  until  then  it  should 
most  certainly  be  deferred. 

The  most  active  and  earnest  of  all  the  advocates  of  literary 
rights  was,  two  years  since,  if  the  writer's  memory  correctly  serves 
him,  the  most  thorough  and  determined  of  all  our  journalists  in 
insisting  on  the  prompt  dismissal  of  thousands  and  tens  of  thousands 
of  men  who,  at  their  country's  call,  had  abandoned  the  pursuits 
and  profits  of  civil  life.  Did  he,  however,  ever  propose  that  they 
should  be  allowed  any  extra  pay  on  which  to  live,  and  by  means 


8  PREFACE. 

of  which  to  support  their  wives  and  children,  in  the  interval  be- 
tween discharge  from  military  service  and  re-establishment  in 
their  old  pursuits  ?  Nothing  of  the  kind  is  now  recollected.  Would 
he  now  advocate  the  enactment  of  a  law  by  means  of  which'  the 
widow  and  children_of  a  major-general  who  had  fallen  on  the  field 
should,  so  far  as  pay  was  concerned,  be  placed  on  a  level  with  an 
ordinary  police  officer  ?  He  might,  but  that  he  would  do  so  could 
not  with  any  certainty  be  affirmed.  She  and  they  would,  never- 
theless, seem  to  have  claims  on  the  consideration  of  American 
men  and  women  fully  equal  to  those  of  the  authoress  of  "  Lady 
Audley's  Secret,"  already,  as  she  is  understood  to  be,  in  the  annual 
receipt  from  this  country  of  more  than  thrice  the  amount  of  the 
widow's  pension,  in  addition  to  tens  of  thousands  at  home.1 

It  is,  however,  as  we  are  gravely  told,  but  ten  per  cent,  that  she 
asks,  and  who  could  or  should  object  to  payment  of  such  a  pit- 
tance ?  Not  many,  perhaps,  if  unaccompanied  by  monopoly  priv- 
leges  that  would  multiply  the  ten  by  ten  and  make  it  an  hundred  ! 
Alone,  the  cost  to  our  readers  might  not  now  exceed  an  annual  mil- 
lion. Let  Congress  then  pass  an  act  appropriating  that  sum  to  be 
distributed  among  foreign  authors  whose  works  had  been,  or  might 
be  republished  here.  That  should  have  the  writer's  vote,  but  he 
objects,  and  will  continue  to  object,  to  any  legislative  action  that 
shall  tend  towards  giving  to  already  "  great  and  wealthy  "  publish- 
ing houses  the  nine  millions  that  they  certainly  will  charge  for 
collecting  the  single  one  that  is  to  go  abroad. 

"  Great  and  wealthy  "  as  they  are  here  said  to  be,  and  as  they 
certainly  are,  we  are  assured  that  even  they  have  serious  troubles, 
against  which  they  greatly  need  to  be  protected.  In  common  with 
many  heretofore  competing  railroad  companies  they  have  found 
that,  however  competition  among  themselves  might  benefit  the 
public,  it  would  tend  rather  to  their  own  injury,  and  therefore 
have  they,  by  means  of  most  stringent  rules,  established  a  "  cour- 
tesy "  copyright,  the  effect  of  which  exhibits  itself  in  the  fact, 
that  the  prices  of  reprinted  books  are  now  rapidly  approaching 
those  of  domestic  production.  Further  advances  in  that  direction 

1  The  London  correspondent  of  Scribner  and  Co.'s  "Book  Buyer"  says  that 
Miss  Braddon's  first  publisher,  Mr.  Tinsley  (who  died  suddenly  last  year),  called 
the  elegant  villa  he  built  for  himself  at  Putney  "Audley  House,"  in  grateful  remem- 
brance of  the  "Lady  "  to  whose  "Secret"  he  was  indebted  for  fortune;  and  Miss 
Braddon  herself,  through  her  man  of  business,  has  recently  purchased  a  stately 
mansion  of  Queen  Anne's  time,  "  Litchfield  House,"  at  Richmond. 


PREFACE.  9 

might,  however,  prove  dangerous ;  "  courtesy  "  rules  not,  as  we  are 
here  informed,  being  readily  susceptible  of  enforcement.  A  salu- 
tary fear  of  interlopers  still  restrains  those  "  great  and  wealthy 
houses,"  at  heavy  annual  cost  to  themselves,  and  with  great  sav- 
ing to  consumers  of  their  products.  That  this  may  all  be 
changed;  that  they  may  build  up  fortunes  with  still  increased 
rapidity ;  that  they  may,  to  a  still  greater  extent,  monopolize  the 
business  of  publication ;  and,  that  the  people  may  be  taxed  to  that 
effect ;  all  that  is  now  needed  is,  that  Congress  shall  pass  a  very 
simple  law  by  means  of  which  a  few  men  in  Eastern  cities  shall  be 
enabled  to  monopolize  the  business  of  republication,  secure  from 
either  Eastern  or  Western  competition.  That  done,  readers  will 
be  likely  to  see  a  state  of  things  similar  to  that  now  exhibited  at 
Chicago,  where  railroad  companies  that  have  secured  to  them- 
selves all  the  exits  and  entrances  of  the  city,  are,  as  we  are  told, 
at  this  moment  engaged  in  organizing  a  combination  that  shall 
have  the  effect  of  dividing  in  fair  proportion  among  the  wolves 
the  numerous  flocks  of  sheep. 

On  all  former  occasions  Northern  advocates  of  literary  monopo- 
lies assured  us  that  it  was  in  that  direction,  and  in  that  alone, 
we  were  to  look  for  the  cheapening  of  books.  Now,  nothing 
of  this  sort  is  at  all  pretended.  On  the  contrary,  we  are  here  told 
of  the  extreme  impropriety  of  a  system  which  makes  it  necessary 
for  a  New  England  essayist  to  accept  a  single  dollar  for  a  volume 
that  under  other  circumstances  would  sell  for  half  a  guinea ;  of  the 
wrong  to  such  essayists  that  results  from  the  issue  of  cheap  "  peri- 
odicals made  up  of  selections  from  the  reviews  and  magazines  of 
Europe ; "  of  the  "  abominable  extravagance  of  buying  a  great  and 
good  novel  in  a  perishable  form  for  a  few  cents ;  "  of  the  increased 
accessibility  of  books  by  the  "  masses  of  the  people  "  that  must 
result  from  increasing  prices ;  and  of  the  greatly  increased  facility 
with  which  circulating  libraries  may  be  formed  whensoever  the 
"  great  and  wealthy  houses  "  shall  have  been  given  power  to  claim 
from  each  and  every  reader  of  Dickens's  novels,  as  their  share  of  the 
monopoly  profits,  thrice  as  much  as  he  now  pays  for  the  book  it- 
self !  This,  however,  is  only  history  repeating  itself  with  a  little 
change  of  place,  the  argument  of  to-day,  coming  from  the  North, 
being  an  almost  exact  repetition  of  that  which,  twenty  years  since, 
came  from  the  South — from  the  mouths  of  men  who  rejoiced  in 
the  fact  that  no  newspapers  were  published  in  their  districts,  and 


10  PREFACE. 

who  well  knew  that  the  way  towards  preventing  the  dissemination 
of  knowledge  lay  in  the  direction  of  granting  the  monopoly  privi- 
leges that  had  been  asked.  The  anti-slavery  men  of  the  present 
thus  repeat  the  argument  of  the  pro-slavery  men  of  the  past,  ex- 
tremes being  thus  brought  close  together. 

Our  people  are  here  assured  that  Russia,  Sweden,  and 
other  countries  are  ready  to  unite  with  them  in  recognizing  the 
"  rights  "  now  claimed.  So,  too,  it  may  be  well  believed,  would  it 
be  with  China,  Japan,  Bokhara,  and  the  Sandwich  Islands.  Of 
what  use,  however,  would  be  such  an  union  ?  Would  it  increase 
the  facilities  for  transplanting  the  ideas  of  American  authors  ?  Are 
not  the  obstacles  to  such  transplantation  already  sufficiently  great, 
and  is  it  desirable  that  they  should  be  at  all  increased  ?  Germany 
has  already  tried  the  experiment,  but  whether  or  not,  when  the 
time  shall  come,  the  existing  treaties  will  be  renewed,  is  very  doubt- 
ful. Where  she  now  pays  dollars,  she  probably  receives  cents. 
Discussion  of  the  question  there  has  led  to  the  translation  and  re- 
publication  of  the  letters  here  now  republished,  and  the  views 
therein  expressed  have  received  the  public  approbation  of  men 
whose  opinions  are  entitled  to  the  highest  consideration.'  What 
has  recently  been  done  in  that  country  in  reference  to  domestic 
copyright,  and  what  has  been  the  effect,  are  well  exhibited  in  an 
article  from  an  English  journal  just  now  received,  a  part  of  which, 
American  moneys  having  been  substituted  for  German  ones,  is 
here  given,  as  follows :  — 

"  We  have  so  long  enjoyed  the  advantage  of  unrestricted  com- 
petition in  the  production  of  the  works  of  the  best  English  writers 
of  the  past,  that  we  can  hardly  realize  what  our  position  would 
have  been  had  the  right  to  produce  Shakespeare,  or  Milton,  or 
Goldsmith,  or  any  of  our  great  classic  writers,  been  monopolized 
by  any  one  publishing-house,  —  certainly  we  should  never  have 
seen  a  shilling  Shakespeare,  or  a  half-crown  Milton ;  and  Shake- 
speare, instead  of  being,  as  he  is, '  familiar  in  our  mouths  as  house- 
hold words,'  would  have  been  known  but  to  the  scholar  and  the 
student.  We  are  far  from  condemning  an  enlightened  system  of 
copyright,  and  have  not  a  word  to  say  in  favor  of  unreasoning 
competition ;  but  we  do  think  that  publishers  and  authors  often 
lose  sight  of  their  own  interest  in  adhering  to  a  system  of  high 
prices  and  restricted  sale.  Tennyson's  works  supply  us  with  a 
case  in  point  —  here,  to  possess  a  set  of  Tennyson's  poems,  a 
reader  must  pay  something  like  38*.  or  40s.  —  in  Boston  you  may 
buy  a  magnificent  edition  of  all  his  works  in  two  volumes  for  some- 


PREFACE.  11 

thing  like  15s.,  and  a  small  edition  for  some  four  or  five  shillings. 
The  result  is  the  purchasers  in  England  are  numbered  by  hun- 
dreds, in  America  by  thousands.  In  Germany  we  have  almost  a 
parallel  case.  There  the  works  of  the  great  German  poets,  of 
Schiller,  of  Goethe,  of  Jean  Paul,  of  Wieland,  and  of  Herder,  are 
at  the  present  time  '  under  the  protecting  privileges  of  the  most 
illustrious  German  Confederation,'  and,  by  special  privilege,  the 
exclusive  property  of  the  Stuttgart  publishing  firm  of  J.  G.  Cotta. 
On  the  forthcoming  9th  of  November  this  monopoly  will  cease, 
and  all  the  works  of  the  above-mentioned  poets  will  be  open  to 
the  speculation  of  German  publishers  generally.  It  may  be  inter- 
esting to  our  readers  to  learn  the  history  of  these  peculiar  legal 
restrictions,  which  have  so  long  prevailed  in  the  German  book- 
trade,  and  the  results  likely  to  follow  from  their  removal. 

"  Until  the  beginning  of  this  century  literary  piracy  was  not 
prohibited  in  the  German  States.  As,  however,  protection  of 
literary  productions  was,  at  last,  emphatically  urged,  the  Acts  of 
the  Confederation  (on  the  reconstruction  of  Germany  in  the  year 
1815)  contained  a  passage  to  the  effect,  that  the  Diet  should,  at 
its  first  meeting,  consider  the  necessity  of  uniform  laws  for  secur- 
ing the  rights  of  literary  men  and  publishers.  The  Diet  moved  in 
the  matter  in  the  year  1818,  appointing  a  commission  to  settle  this 
question  ;  and,  thanks  to  that  supreme  profoundness  which  was 
ever  applied  to  the  affairs  of  the  father-land  by  this  illustrious 
body,  after  twenty-two  years  of  deliberation,  on  the  9th  of  Nov., 
1837,  decreed  the  law,  that  the  rights  of  authorship  should  be  ac- 
knowledged and  respected,  at  least,  for  the  space  of  ten  years ; 
copyright  for  a  longer  period,  however,  being  granted  for  volumin- 
ous and  costly  works,  and  for  the  works  of  the  great  German  poets. 

"  In  the  course  of  time,  however,  a  copyright  for  ten  years 
proved  insufficient  even  for  the  commonest  works ;  it  was  there- 
fore extended  by  a  decree  of  the  Diet,  dated  June  19,  1845,  over 
the  natural  term  of  the  author's  life  and  for  thirty  years  after  his 
death.  With  respect  to  the  works  of  all  authors  deceased  before 
the  9th  of  November,  1837 — including  the  works  of  the  poets 
enumerated  above  —  the  Diet  decided  that  they  could  all  be  pro- 
tected until  the  9th  of  November,  1867.  , 

"  It  was  to  be  expected  that  the  firm  of  J.  G.  Cotta,  favored  until 
now  with  so  valuable  a  monopoly,  would  make  all  possible  exertions 
not  to  be  surpassed  in  the  coming  battle  of  the  Publishers,  though  it 
is  a  somewhat  curious  sight  to  see  this  haughty  house,  after  having 
used  its  privileges  to  the  last  moment,  descend  now  suddenly  from 
its  high  monopolistic  stand  into  the  arena  of  competition,  and 
compete  for  public  favor  with  its  plebeian  rivals.  Availing  itself 
of  the  advantage  which  the  monopoly  hitherto  attached  to  it  natu- 
rally gives  it,  the  house  has  just  commenced  issuing  a  cheap 
edition  of  the  German  classics,  under  the  title  '  Bibliothek  fur 
Alle.  Meisterwerke  deutscher  Classiker,'  in  weekly  parts,  6  cts. 


12  PREFACE. 

each  ;  containing  the  selected  works  of  Schiller,  at  the  price  of 
75  cts.,  and  the  selected  works  of  Goethe,  at  the  price  of  $1.50. 
And  now,  just  as  the  monopoly  is  gliding  from  their  hands,  the 
same  firm  offers,  in  a  small  16mo  edition,  Schiller's  complete 
works,  12  vols.,  for  75  cts. 

"  Another  publisher,  A.  H.  Payne,  of  Leipzig,  announces  a  com- 
plete edition  of  Schiller's  works,  including  some  unpublished 
pieces,  for  75  cts. 

"  Again,  the  well-known  firm  of  F.  A.  Brockhaus  holds  out  a 
prospectus  of  a  corrected  critical  edition  of  the  German  poets  of 
the  eighteenth  and  nineteenth  century,  which  we  have  every 
reason  to  believe  will  merit  success.  A  similar  enterprise  is 
announced,  just  now,  by  the  Bibliographical  Institution  of  Hild- 
burghausen,  under  the  title,  '  Bibliothek  der  deutschen  National- 
literatur,'  edited  by.Heinr.  Kurz,  in  weekly  parts  of  10  sheets,  at 
the  price  of  12  cts.  each.  Even  an  illustrated  edition  of  the 
Classics  will  be  presented  to  the  public,  in  consequence  of  the  ex- 
piration of  the  copyright.  The  Grote'sche  Buchhandlung,  of 
Berlin,  is  issuing  the  '  Hausbibliothek  deutscher  Classiker,'  with 
wood-cut  illustrations  by  such  eminent  artists  as  Richter,  Thu- 
mann,  and  others ;  and  the  first  part,  just  published,  containing 
Louise,  by  Voss,  with  truly  artistic  illustrations,  has  met  with  gen- 
eral approbation.  But,  above  all,  the  popular  edition  of  the 
poets,  issued  by  G.  Hempel,  of  Berlin,  under  the  general  title  of 
'  National  Bibliothek  sammtlicher  deutscher  Classiker,'  8vo.  in 
parts,  6  cts.  each,  seems  destined  to  surpass  all  others  in  popular- 
ity, though  not  in  merit.  Of  the  first  part  (already  published), 
containing  Burger's  Poems,  300,000  copies  have  been  sold,  and 
150,000  subscribers'  names  have  been  registered  for  the  complete 
series.  This  immense  sale,  unequalled  in  the  annals  of  the  German 
book-trade,  will  certainly  induce  many  other  publishers  to  embark 
in  similar  enterprises"  —  Triibner's  Literary  Record,  Oct.  1867. 

Judging  from  this,  there  will,  five  years  hence,  be  a  million  of 
families  in  possession  of  the  works  of  Schiller,  Burger,  Goethe, 
Herder  and  others,  that  thus  far  have  been  compelled  to  dispense 
with  their  perusal.  Sad  to  think,  however,  they  will  be  of  those 
cheap  editions  now  so  much  despised  by  American  advocates  of 
monopoly  privileges !  How  much  better  for  the  German  people 
would  it  not  have  been  had  their  Parliament  recognized  the  per- 
petuity of  literary  rights,  and  thus  enabled  the  "  great  and  wealthy 
house "  of  Cotta  and  Co.  to  carry  into  full  effect  the  idea  that 
their  own  editions  should  alone  be  published,  thereby  adding  other 
millions  to  the  very  many  of  which  they  already  are  the  owners ! 

At  this  moment  a  letter  from  Mr.  Bayard  Taylor  advises  us 
that  German  circulating  libraries  impede  the  sale  of  books  ;  that 


PREFACE.  13 

the  circulation  of  even  highly  popular  works  is  limited  within 
20,000;  and  that,  as  a  necessary  consequence,  German  authors 
are  not  paid  so  well  as  of  right  they  should  be.1  This,  however, 
is  precisely  the  state  of  things  that,  as  we  are  now  assured,  should 
be  brought  about  in  this  country,  prices  being  raised,  and  readers 
being  driven  to  the  circulating  library  by  reason  of  the  deficiency 
of  the  means  required  for  forming  the  private  one.  It  is  the  one 
that  would  be  brought  about  should  our  authors,  unhappily  for 
themselves,  succeed  in  obtaining  what  is  now  demanded. 

The  day  has  passed,  in  this  country,  for  the  recognition  of  either 
perpetuity  or  universality  of  literary  rights.  The  wealthy  Caro- 
linian, anxious  that  books  might  be  high  in  price,  and  knowing 
well  that  monopoly  privileges  were  opposed  to  freedom,  gladly  co- 
operated with  Eastern  authors  and  publishers,  anti-slavery  as  they 
professed  to  be.  The  enfranchised  black,  on  the  contrary,  desires 
that  books  may  be  cheap,  and  to  that  end  he  and  his  representa- 
tives will  be  found  in  all  the  future  co-operating  with  the  people 
of  the  Centre  and  the  West  in  maintaining  the  doctrine  that  lite- 
rary privileges  exist  in  virtue  of  grants  from  the  people  who  own 
the  materials  out  of  which  books  are  made  ;  that  those  privileges 
have  been  perhaps  already  too  far  extended ;  that  there  exists  not 
even  a  shadow  of  reason  for  any  further  extension ;  and  that  to 
grant  what  now  is  asked  would  be  a  positive  wrong  to  the  many 
millions  of  consumers,  as  well  as  an  obstacle  to  be  now  placed  in 
the  road  towards  civilization. 

The  amount  now  paid  for  public  service  under  our  various  gov- 
ernments is  more  than,  were  it  fairly  distributed,  would  suffice  for 
giving  proper  reward  to  all.  Unfortunately  the  distribution  is 
very  bad,  the  largest  compensation  generally  going  to  those  who 
render  the  smallest  service.  So,  too,  is  it  with  regard  to  literary 
employments ;  and  so  is  it  likely  to  continue  throughout  the 
future.  Grant  all  that  now  is  asked,  and  the  effect  will  be  seen 
in  the  fact,  that  of  the  vastly  increased  taxation  ninety  per  cent, 
will  go  to  those  who  work  for  money  alone,  and  are  already  over- 
paid, leaving  but  little  to  be  added  to  the  rewards  of  conscien- 
tious men  with  whom  their  work  is  a  labor  of  love,  as  is  the  case 
with  the  distinguished  author  of  the  "  History  of  the  Nether- 
lands." 

Twenty  years  ago,  Macaulay  advised  his  literary  friends  to  be 
i  New  York  Tribune,  Nov.  29. 


14  PREFACE. 

content,  believing,  as  he  told  them,  that  the  existing  "  wholesome 
copyright"  was  likely  to  "share  in  the  disgrace  and  danger"  of 
the  more  extended  one  which  they  then  so  much  desired  to  see 
created.  Let  our  authors  reflect  on  this  advice !  Success  now, 
were  it  possible  that  it  should  be  obtained,  would  be  productive  of 
great  danger  in  the  already  not  distant  future.  In  the  natural 
course  of  things,  most  of  our  authorship,  for  many  years  to  come, 
will  be  found  east  of  the  Hudson,  most  of  the  buyers  of  books, 
meanwhile,  being  found  south  and  west  of  that  river.  Interna- 
tional'copyright  will  give  to  the  former  limited  territory  an  abso- 
lute monopoly  of  the  business  of  republication,  the  then  great 
cities  of  the  West  being  almost  as  completely  deprived  of  partici- 
pation therein  as  are  now  the  towns  and  cities  of  Canada  and 
Australia.  On  the  one  side,  there  will  be  found  a  few  thousand 
persons  interested  in  maintaining  the  monopolies  that  had  been 
granted  to  authors  and  publishers,  foreign  and  domestic.  On  the 
other,  sixty  or  eighty  millions,  tired  of  taxation  and  determined  that 
books  shall  be  more  cheaply  furnished.  War  will  then  come,  and 
the  domestic  author,  sharing  in  the  "  disgrace  and  danger  "  attend- 
ant upon  his  alliance  with  foreign  authors  and  domestic  publishers, 
may  perhaps  find  reason  to  rejoice  if  the  people  fail  to  arrive  at 
the  conclusion  that  the  last  extension  of  his  own  privileges  had 
been  inexpedient  and  should  be  at  once  recalled.  Let  him  then 
study  that  well-known  fable  of  ^Esop  entitled  "  The  Dog  and  the 
Shadow,"  and  take  warning  from  it ! 

The  writer  of  these  Letters  had  no  personal  interest  in  the 
question  therein  discussed.  Himself  an  author,  he  has  since  glad- 
ly witnessed  the  translation  and  republication  of  his  works  in  vari- 
ous countries  of  Europe,  his  sole  reason  for  writing  them  having 
been  found  in  a  desire  for  strengthening  the  many  against  the 
few  by  whom  the  former  have  so  long,  to  a  greater  or  less  ex- 
tent, been  enslaved.  To  that  end  it  is  that  he  now  writes,  fully 
believing  that  the  right  is  on  the  side  of  the  consumer  of  books, 
and  not  with  their  producers,  whether  authors  or  publishers. 
Between  the  two  there  is,  however,  a  perfect  harmony  of  all 
real  and  permanent  interests,  and  greatly  will  he  be  rejoiced  if  he 
shall  have  succeeded  in  persuading  even  some  few  of  his  literary 
countrymen  that  such  is  the  fact,  and  that  the  path  of  safety  will 
be  found  in  the  direction  of  LETTING  WELL  ENOUGH  ALONE. 

The  reward  of  literary  service,  and  the  estimation  in  which 


PREFACE.  15 

literary  men  are  held,  both  grow  with  growth  in  that  power  of 
combination  which  results  from  diversification  of  employments  ; 
from  bringing  consumers  and  producers  close  together ;  and  from 
thus  stimulating  the  activity  of  the  societary  circulation.  Both 
decline  as  producers  and  consumers  become  more  widely  sepa- 
rated and  as  the  circulation  becomes  more  languid,  as  is  the  case 
in  all  the  countries  now  subjected  to  the  British  free  trade  influ- 
ence. Eet  American  authors  then  unite  in  asking  of  Congress 
the  establishment  of  a  fixed  and  steady  policy  which  shall  have 
the  effect  of  giving  us  that  industrial  independence  without  which 
there  can  be  neither  political  nor  literary  independence.  That 
once  secured,  they  would  thereafter  find  no  need  for  asking  the 
establishment  of  a  system  of  taxation  which  would  prove  so 
burdensome  to  our  people  as,  in  the  end,  to  be  ruinous  to  them- 
selves. 

H.   C.   C. 
PHILADELPHIA, 
Dec.  1867. 


LETTERS 
INTERNATIONAL    COPYRIGHT. 


LETTER    I. 

DEAR  SIR  :  —  You  ask  for  information  calculated  to  enable  you 
to  act  understandingly  in  reference  to  the  international  copyright 
treaty  now  awaiting  the  action  of  the  Senate.  The  subject  is  an 
important  one,  more  so,  as  I  think,  than  is  commonly  supposed, 
and  being  very  glad  to  see  that  it  is  now  occupying  your  attention, 
it  will  afford  me  much  pleasure  to  comply,  as  far  as  in  my  power, 
with  your  request. 

Independently  of  the  principle  involved,  it  seems  to  me  that  the 
course  now  proposed  to  be  pursued  is  liable  to  very  grave  objec- 
tion. It  is  an  attempt  to  substitute  the  action  of  the  Executive  for 
that  of  the  Legislature,  and  in  a  case  in  which  the  latter  is  fully 
competent  to  do  the  work.  For  almost  twenty  years,  Congress 
has  been  besieged  with  applications  on  the  subject,  but  without 
effect.  Senate  Committees  have  reported  in  favor  of  the  measure, 
but  the  lower  House,  composed  of  the  direct  representatives  of  the 
people,  has  remained  unmoved.  In  despair  of  succeeding  under 
any  of  the  ordinary  forms  of  proceeding,  its  friends  have  invoked 
the  legislation  of  the  Executive  power,  and  the  result  is  seen  in 
the  fact,  that  the  Senate,  as  a  branch  of  the  Executive,  is  now 
called  upon  to  sanction  a  law,  in  the  enactment  of  which  the  House 
of  Representatives  could  not  be  induced  to  unite.  This  may  be, 
and  doubtless  is,  in  accordance  with  the  letter  of  the  Constitution, 
but  it  is  so  decidedly  in  opposition  to  its  spirit  that,  even  were  there 
no  other  objection,  the  treaty  should  be  rejected.  That,  however, 
is  but  the  smallest  of  the  objections  to  it 

If  the  people  required  such  a  law,  nothing  could  be  more  easy 


18  INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT. 

than  to  act  in  this  case  as  we  have  done  before  in  similar  ones. 
When  we  desired  to  arrange  for  reciprocity  in  relation  to  naviga- 
tion, we  fixed  the  terms,  and  declared  that  all  the  other  nations  of 
the  earth  might  accede  to  them  if  they  would.  No  treaty  was 
needed,  and  we  therefore  became  bound  to  no  one.  It  was  in  our 
power  to  repeal  the  law  when  we  chose.  So,  again,  in  regard  to 
patents.  Foreigners  exercise  the  power  of  patenting  their  inven- 
tions, but  they  do  so  under  a  law  that  is  liable  to  repeal  at  the 
pleasure  of  Congress.  In  both  of  these  cases,  the  bills  under- 
went public  discussion,  and  the  people  that  were  to  be  subjected 
to  the  Jaw,  saw,  and  understood,  and  amended  the  bills  before  they 
became  laws.  Contrast,  I  beg  of  you,  this  course  of  proceeding 
with  the  one  now  proposed  to  be  pursued  in  reference  to  one  of 
the  largest  branches  of  our  internal  trade.  Finding  that  no  bill 
that  could  be  prepared  could  stand  the  ordeal  of  public  discussion, 
a  treaty  has  been  negotiated,  the  terms  of  which  seem  to  be  known 
to  none  but  the  negotiators,  and  that  treaty  has  been  sent  to  your 
House  of  Congress,  there  to  be  discussed  in  secret  session  by  a 
number  of  gentlemen,  most  of  whom  have  given  little  attention  to 
the  general  principle  involved,  while  not  even  a  single  one  can  be 
supposed  qualified  to  judge  of  the  practical  working  of  the  pro- 
visions by  whose  aid  the  principle  is  to  be  carried  out.  Once 
confirmed,  the  treaty  can  be  changed  only  with  the  consent  of 
England.  Here  we  have  secrecy  in  the  making  of  laws,  and  ir- 
revocability of  the  law  when  made ;  whereas,  in  all  other  cases, 
we  have  had  publicity  and  revocability.  Legislation  like  that  now 
proposed  would  seem  to  be  better  suited  to  the  monarchies  of 
Europe,  than  to  the  republic  of  the  United  States.  The  reason 
why  this  extraordinary  course  has  been  adopted  is,  that  the  people 
have  never  required  the  passage  of  such  a  law,  and  could  not  be 
persuaded  to  sanction  it  now,  were  it  submitted  to  them. 

The  French  and  English  copyright  treaty  has,  as  I  understand, 
caused  great  deterioration  in  the  value  of  property  that  had  been 
accumulated  in  France  under  the  system  that  had  before  existed, 
and  such  may  prove  to  be  the  case  with  the  one  now  under  con- 
sideration. Should  it  be  so,  the  deterioration  would  prove  to  be 
fifty  times  greater  in  amount  than  it  was  in  France.  Will  it  do 
so?  No  one  knows,  because  those  whose  interests  are  to  be 
affected  by  the  law  are  not  permitted  to  read  the  law  that  is  to  be 
made.  They  know  well  that  they  have  not  been  consulted,  and 


INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT.  19 

equally  well  do  they  know  that  the  negotiator  is  not  familiar  with 
the  trade  that  is  to  be  regulated,  and  is  liable,  therefore,  to  have 
given  his  assent  to  provisions  that  will  work  injury  never  contem- 
plated by  him  at  the  time  the  treaty  had  been  made.  Again,  pro- 
visions may  have  been  inserted,  with  a  view  to  prevent  injury  to 
the  publishers,  or  to  the  public,  that  would  be  found  in  practice  to 
be  utterly  futile,  or  even  to  augment  the  difficulty  instead  of 
remedying  it.  That  such  result  would  follow  the  adoption  of  some 
of  those  whose  insertion  has  been  urged,  I  can  positively  assert. 
In  this  state  of  things,  it  would  seem  to  be  proper  that  we  should 
know  whether  the  provisions  of  the  treaty  were  submitted  to  the 
examination  of  any  of  the  parties  interested  for  or  against  it,  and 
if  so,  to  whom.  So  far  as  I  can  learn,  none  of  those  opposed  to  it 
have  had  any  opportunity  afforded  them  of  reading  the  law,  and  if 
any  advice  has  been  taken,  it  must  have  been  of  those  publishers 
who  are  in  favor  of  it.  Those  gentlemen,  however,  are  precisely 
the  persons  likely  most  to  profit  by  the  adoption  of  the  principle 
recognized  by  the  treaty  ;  and  the  more  disadvantageous  to  others 
the  provisions  for  carrying  that  principle  into  effect,  the  greater 
must  be  the  advantage  to  themselves.  They,  therefore,  can  be 
regarded  as  little  more  than  the  exponents  of  the  wishes  of  their 
English  friends,  who  were  counselling  the  British  Minister  on  the 
one  hand,  while  on  the  other  they  were,  through  their  friends  here, 
counselling  the  American  one.  A  treaty  negotiated  under  such 
circumstances,  would  seem  little  likely  to  provide  for  the  general 
interests  of  the  American  people. 

When,  in  1837,  the  attempt  was  first  made  to  secure  for  English 
authors  the  privilege  of  copyright,  a  large  number  of  them  united 
in  an  agreement  declaring  a  certain  New  York  house  to  be  "  the 
sole  authorized  publishers  and  issuers  "  of  their  works.  Now,  had 
that  house  volunteered  its  advice  to  the  Secretary  of  State  of  that 
day,  he  would  scarcely  have  regarded  it  as  sufficiently  disinter- 
ested to  be  qualified  for  the  office  it  had  undertaken ;  and  yet,  if 
any  advice  in  the  present  case  has  been  asked,  it  would  seem  that 
it  must  have  been  from  houses  that  now  look  forward  to  filling 
the  place  then  occupied  by  that  single  one,  and  that  cannot, 
therefore,  be  regarded  as  fitted  for  the  office  of  counsellors  to  the 
-  Secretary  of  the  present  day.  Recollect,  I  am,  as  is  everybody 
else,  entirely  in  the  dark.  No  one  knows  who  furnished  advice  as 
to  the  treaty,  nor  does  any  one  know  what  is  to  be  the  law  when  it 


20  INTERNATIONAL   COPYRIGHT. 

shall  have  been  confirmed.  Neither  can  any  one  tell  how  the 
errors  -that  may  now  be  made  will  be  corrected.  With  a  law 
regularly  passed  through  both  Houses  of  Congress,  these  difficul- 
ties could  not  arise.  They  are  a  natural  consequence  of  this 
attempt  to  substitute  the  will  of  the  Executive  for  that  of  the 
people,  as  expressed  by  the  House  of  Representatives,  and  should, 
as  I  think,  weigh  strongly  on  the  minds  of  Senators  when  called 
to  vote  upon  the  treaty.  Their  constituents  have  a  right  to  see, 
and  to  discuss,  the  laws  that  are  proposed  before  those  laws  are 
finally  made,  and  whenever  it  is  attempted,  as  in  the  present  case, 
to  stifle  discussion,  we  may  reasonably  infer  that  wrong  is  about  to 
be  done.  This  is,  I  believe,  the  first  case  in  which,  on  account  of 
the  unpopularity  of  the  law  proposed,  it  has  been  attempted  to  de- 
prive the  popular  branch  of  Congress  of  its  constitutional  share  in 
legislation,  and  if  this  be  sanctioned  it  is  difficult  to  see  what  other 
interests  may  not  be  subjected  to  similar  action  on  the  part  of  the 
Executive.  In  all  such  cases,  it  is  the  first  step  that  is  most  diffi- 
cult, and  before  making  the  one  now  proposed,  you  should,  as  I 
think,  weigh  well  the  importance  of  the  precedent  about  to  be 
established.  No  one  can  hold  in  greater  respect  than  I  do,  the 
honorable  gentleman  who  negotiated  this  treaty  ;  but  in  thus 
attempting  to  substitute  the  executive  will  for  legislative  action,  he 
seems  to  me  to  have  made  a  grave  mistake. 

In  the  claim  now  made  in  behalf  of  English  authors,  there  is 
great  apparent  justice  ;  but  that  which  is  not  true,  often  puts  on 
the  appearance  of  truth.  For  thousands  of  years,  it  seemed  so 
obviously  true  that  the  sun  revolved  around  the  earth  that  the  fact 
was  not  disputed,  and  yet  it  came  finally  to  be  proved  that  the 
earth  revolved  around  the  sun.  Ricardo's  theory  of  the  occupa- 
tion of  the  earth,  the  foundation-stone  of  his  system,  had  so  much 
apparent  truth  to  recommend  it,  that  it  was  almost  universally 
adopted,  and  is  now  the  basis  of  the  whole  British  politico-econo- 
mical system ;  and  yet  the  facts  are  directly  the  reverse  of  what 
Ricardo  had  supposed  them  to  be.  Such  being  the  case,  it  might 
be  that,  upon  a  full  examination  of  the  subject,  we  should  find  that, 
in  admitting  the  claim  of  foreign  authors,  we  should  be  doing  in- 
justice and  not  justice.  The  English  press  has,  it  is  true,  for 
many  years  been  engaged  in  teaching  us  that  we  were  little  better 
than  thieves  or  pirates  ;  but  that  press  has  been  so  uniformly  and 
unsparingly  abusive  of  us,  whenever  we  have  failed  to  grant  all 


INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT.  21 

that  it  has  claimed,  that  its  views  are  entitled  to  little  weight.  At 
home,  many  of  our  authors  have  taken  the  same  side  of  the  ques- 
tion ;  and  the  only  answer  that  has  ever,  to  my  knowledge,  been 
made,  has  been,  that  if  we  admitted  the  claims  of  foreign  authors, 
the  prices  of  books  would  be  raised,  and  the  people  would  be  de- 
prived of  their  accustomed  supplies  of  cheap  literature  —  as  I 
think,  a  very  weak  sort  of  defense.  If  nothing  better  than  this 
can  be  said,  we  may  as  well  at  once  plead  guilty  to  the  charge  of 
piracy,  and  commence  a  new  and  more  honest  course  of  action. 
Evil  may  not  be  done  that  good  may  come  of  it,  nor  may  we  steal 
an  author's  brains  that  our  people  may  be  cheaply  taught.  To 
admit  that  the  end  justifies  the  means,  would  be  to  adopt  the  line 
of  argument  so  often  used  by  English  speakers,  in  and  out  of 
Parliament,  when  they  defend  the  poisoning  of  the  Chinese  people 
by  means  of  opium  introduced  in  defiance  of  their  government, 
because  it  furnishes  revenue  to  India  ;  or  that  which  teaches  that 
Canada  should  be  retained  as  a  British  colony,  because  of  the 
facility  it  affords  for  violation  of  our  laws ;  or  that  which  would 
have  us  regard  smugglers,  in  general,  as  the  great  reformers  of  the 
age.  We  stand  in  need  of  no  such  morality  as  this.  We  can 
afford  to  pay  for  what  we  want ;  but,  even  were  it  otherwise,  our 
motto  here,  and  everywhere,  should  be  the  old  French  one : 
"  Fais  ce  que  doy,  advienne  que  pourra  " —  Act  justly,  and  leave 
the  result  to  Providence.  Before  acting,  however,  we  should 
determine  on  which  side  justice  lies.  Unless  I  am  greatly  in 
error,  it  is  not  on  the  side  of  international  copyright.  My  rea- 
sons for  this  belief  will  now  be  given. 

The  facts  or  ideas  contained  in  a  book  constitute  its  body.  The 
language  in  which  they  are  conveyed  to  the  reader  constitute  the 
clothing  of  the  body.  For  the  first  no  copyright  is  allowed. 
Humboldt  spent  many  years  of  his  life  in  collecting  facts  relative 
to  the  southern  portion  of  this  continent ;  yet  so  soon  as  he  gave 
them  to  the  light  they  ceased  to  be  his,  and  became  the  common 
property  of  all  mankind.  Captain  Wilkes  and  his  companions  spent 
several  years  in  exploring  the  Southern  Ocean,  and  brought  from 
there  a  vast  amount  of  new  facts,  all  of  which  became  at  once  com- 
mon property.  Sir  John  Franklin  made  numerous  expeditions  to 
the  North,  during  which  he  collected  many  facts  of  high  importance, 
for  which  he  had  no  copyright.  So  with  Park,  Burkhard,  and 
others,  who  lost  their  lives  in  the  exploration  of  Africa.  Captain 


22  INTERNATIONAL   COPYRIGHT. 

McClure  has  just  accomplished  th/2  Northwest  Passage,  yet  has  he 
110  exclusive  right  to  the  publication  of  the  fact.  So  has  it  ever 
been.  For  thousands  of  year's  men  like  these  —  working  men, 
abroad  and  at  home : —  have  been  engaged  in  the  collection  of 
facts  ;  and  thus  there  has  been  accumulated  a  vast  body  of  them, 
all  of  which  have  become  common  property,  while  even  the 
names  of  most  of  the  men  by  whom  they  were  collected  have 
passed  away.  Next  to  these  come  the  men  who  have  been 
engaged  in  the  arrangement  of  facts  and  in  their  comparison, 
with  a  view  to  deduce  therefrom  the  laws  by  which  the  world  is 
governed,  and  which  constitute  science.  Copernicus  devoted  his 
life  to  the  study  of  numerous  facts,  by  aid  of  which  he  was  at 
length  enabled  to  give  to  the  world  a  knowledge  of  the  great  fact 
that  the  earth  revolved  around  the  sun  ;  but  he  had  therein,  from 
the  moment  of  its  publication,  no  more  property  than  had  the 
most  violent  of  his  opponents.  The  discovery  of  other  laws 
occupied  the  life  of  Kepler,  but  he  had  no  property  in  them. 
Newton  spent  many  years  of  his  life  in  the  composition  of  his 
"  Principia,"  yet  in  that  he  had  no  copyright,  except  for  the  mere 
clothing  in  which  his  ideas  were  placed  before  the  world.  The 
body  was  common  property.  So,  too,  with  Bacon  and  Locke, 
Leibnitz  and  Descartes,  Franklin,  Priestley,  and  Davy,  Quesnay, 
Turgot,  and  Adam  Smith,  Lamarck  and  Cuvier,  and  all  other  men 
who  have  aided  in  carrying  science  to  the  point  at  which  it  has 
now  arrived.  They  have  had  no  property  in  their  ideas.  If  they 
labored,  it  was  because  they  had  a  thirst  for  knowledge.  They 
could  expect  no  pecuniary  reward,  nor  had  they  much  reason  even 
to  hope  for  fame.  New  ideas  were,  necessarily,  a  subject  of  con- 
troversy ;  and  cases  are,  even  in  our  time,  not  uncommon,  in 
which  the  announcement  of  an  idea  at  variance  with  those  com- 
monly recorded  has  tended  greatly  to  the  diminution  of  the  enjoy- 
ment of  life  by  the  man  by  whom  it  has  been  announced.  The 
contemporaries  of  Harvey  could  scarcely  be  made  to  believe  in 
the  circulation  of  the  blood.  Mr.  Owen  might  have  lived  happily 
in  the  enjoyment  of  a  large  fortune  had  he  not  conceived  new 
views  of  society.  These  he  gave  to  the  world  in  the  form  of  a 
book,  that  led  him  into  controversy  which  has  almost  lasted  out 
his  life,  while  the  effort  to  carry  his  ideas  into  effect  has  cost  him 
his  fortune.  Admit  that  he  had  been  right,  and  that  the  correct- 
ness of  his  views  were  now  fully  established,  he  would  have  in 


INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT.  23 

them  no  property  whatever ;  nor  would  his  books  be  now  yielding 
him  a  shilling,  because  later  writers  would  be  placino-  them  be- 
fore the  world  in  other  and  more  attractive  clothing.  So  is  it 
with  the  books  of  all  the  men  I  have  named.  The  copyright  of 
the  "  Principia  "  would  be  worth  nothing,  as  would  be  the  case  Avith 
all  that  Franklin  wrote  on  electricity,  or  Davy  on  chemistry.  Few 
now  read  Adam  Smith,  and  still  fewer  Bacon,  Leibnitz,  or  Des- 
cartes. Examine  where  we  may,  we  shall  find  that  the  collectors 
of  the  facts  and  the  producers  of  the  ideas  which  constitute  the 
body  of  books,  have  received  little  or  no  reward  while  thus 
engaged  in  contributing  so  largely  to  the  augmentation  of  the  com- 
mon property  of  mankind. 

For  what,  then,  is  copyright  given  ?  For  the  clothing  in  which 
the  body  is  produced  to  the  world.  Examine  Mr.  Macaulay's 
"  History  of  England  "  and  you  will  find  that  the  body  is  composed 
of  what  is  common  property.  Not  only  have  the  facts  been  re- 
corded by  others,  but  the  ideas,  too,  are  derived  from  the  works  of 
men  who  have  labored  for  the  world  without  receiving  and  fre- 
quently without  the  expectation  of  receiving,  any  pecuniary  com- 
pensation for  their  labors.  Mr.  Macaulay  has  read  much  and 
carefully,  and  he  has  thus  been  enabled  to  acquire  great  skill  in 
arranging  and  clothing  his  facts ;  but  the  reader  of  his  books  will 
find  in  them  no  contribution  to  positive  knowledge.  The  works 
of  men  who  make  contributions  of  that  kind  are  necessarily  con- 
troversial and  distasteful  to  the  reader ;  for  which  reason  they  find 
few  readers,  and  never  pay  their  authors.  Turn  now  to  our  own 
authors,  Prescott  and  Bancroft,  who  have  furnished  us  with  histor- 
ical works  of  so  great  excellence,  and  you  will  find  a  state  of 
things  precisely  similar.  They  have  taken  a  large  quantity  of 
materials  out  of  the  common  stock,  in  which  you.  and  I,  and  all 
of  us  have  an  interest ;  and  those  materials  they  have  so  reclothed 
as  to  render  them  attractive  of  purchasers ;  but  this  is  all  they 
have  done.  Look  to  Mr.  Webster's  works,  and  you  will  find  it 
the  same.  He  was  a  great  reader.  He  studied  the  Constitution 
carefully,  with  a  view  to  understand  what  were  the  views  of  its  au- 
thors, and  those  views  he  reproduced  in  different  and  more  attract- 
ive clothing,  and  there  his  work  ended.  He  never  pretended,  as 
I  think,  to  furnish  the  world  with  any  new  ideas ;  and  if  he  had 
done  so,  he  could  have  claimed  no  property  in  them.  Few  now 
read  the  heavy  volumes  containing  the  speeches  of  Fox  and  Pitt. 


24  INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT. 

They  did  nothing  but  reproduce  ideas  that  were  common  property, 
and  in  such  clothing  as  answered  the  purposes  of  the  moment. 
Sir  Robert  Peel  did  the  same.  The  world  would  now  be  just  as 
wise  had  he  never  lived,  for  he  made  no  contribution  to  the  gen- 
eral stock  of  knowledge.  The  great  work  of  Chancellor  Kent  is, 
to  use  the  words  of  Judge  Story,  "  but  a  new  combination  and 
arrangement  of  old  materials,  in  which  the  skill  and  judgment  of 
the  author  in  the  selection  and  exposition,  and  accurate  use  of 
those  materials,  constitute  the  basis  of  his  reputation,  as  well  as 
of  his  copyright."  The  world  at  large  is  the  owner  of  all  the 
facts  that  have  been  collected,  and  of  all  the  ideas  that  have  been 
deduced  from  them,  and  its  right  in  them  is  precisely  the  same 
that  the  planter  has  in  the  bale  of  cotton  that  has  been  raised  on 
his  plantation ;  and  the  course  of  proceeding  of  both  has,  thus 
far,  been  precisely  similar ;  whence  I  am  induced  to  infer  that,  in 
both  cases,  right  has  been  done.  When  the  planter  hands  his 
cotton  to  the  spinner  and  the  weaver,  he  does  not  say,  "  Take  this 
and  convert  it  into  cloth,  and  keep  the  cloth  ; "  but  he  does  say, 
"  Spin  and  weave  this  cotton,  and  for  so  doing  you  shall  have  such 
interest  in  the  cloth  as  will  give  you  a  fair  compensation  for  your 
labor  and  skill,  but,  when  that  shall  have  been  paid,  the  cloth  will 
be  mine"  This  latter  is  precisely  what  society,  the  owner  of  facts 
and  ideas,  says  to  the  author :  "  Take  these  raw  materials  that 
have  been  collected,  put  them  together,  and  clothe  them  after  your 
own  fashion,  and  for  a  given  time  we  will  agree  that  nobody  else 
shall  present  them  in  the  same  dress.  During  that  time  you  may 
exhibit  them  for  your  own  profit,  but  at  the  end  of  that  period  the 
clothing  will  become  common  property,  as  the  body  now  is.  It  is 
to  the  contributions  of  your  predecessors  to  our  common  stock 
that  you  are  indebted  for  the  power  to  make  your  book,  and  we 
require  you,  in  your  turn,  to  contribute  towards  the  augmentation 
of  the  stock  that  is  to  be  used  by  your  successors."  This  is  jus- 
tice, and  to  grant  more  than  this  would  be  injustice. 

Let  us  turn  now,  for  a  moment,  to  the  producers  of  works  of 
fiction.  Sir  Walter  Scott  had  carefully  studied  Scottish  and 
Border  history,  and  thus  had  filled  his  mind  with  facts  preserved, 
and  ideas  produced,  by  others,  which  he  reproduced  in  a  different 
form.  He  made  no  contribution  to  knowledge.  So,  too,  with  our 
own  very  successful  Washington  Irving.  He  drew  largely  upon 
the  common  stock  of  ideas,  and  dressed  them  up  in  a  new,  and 


INTERNATIONAL   COPYRIGHT.  25 

what  has  proved  to  be  a  most  attractive  form.  So,  again,  with 
Mr.  Dickens.  Read  his  "  Bleak  House  "  and  you  will  find  that  he 
has  been  a  most  careful  observer  of  men  and  things,  and  has  there- 
by been  enabled  to  collect  a  great  number  of  facts  that  he  has 
dressed  up  in  different  forms,  but  that  is  all  he  has  done.  He  is 
in  the  condition  of  a  man  who  had  entered  a  large  garden  and 
collected  a  variety  of  the  most  beautiful  flowers  growing  therein, 
of  which  he  had  made  a  fine  bouquet  The  owner  of  the  garden 
would  naturally  say  to  him:  "The  flowers  are  mine,  but  the 
arrangement  is  yours.  You  cannot  keep  the  bouquet,  but  you  may 
smell  it,  or  show  it  for  your  own  profit,  for  an  hour  or  two,  but 
then  it  must  come  to  me.  If  you  prefer  it,  I  am  willing  to  pay 
you  for  your  services,  giving  you  a  fair  compensation  for  your  time 
and  taste."  This  is  exactly  what  society  says  to  Mr.  Dickens, 
who  makes  such  beautiful  literary  bouquets.  What  is  right  in  the 
individual,  cannot  be  wrong  in  the  mass  of  individuals  of  which 
society  is  composed.  Nevertheless,  the  author  objects  to  this,  in- 
sisting that  he  is  owner  of  the  bouquet  itself,  although  he  has  paid 
no  wages  to  the  man  who  raised  the  flowers.  Were  he  asked  to 
do  so,  he  would,  as  I  shall  show  in  another  letter,  regard  it  as  lead- 
ing to  great  injustice. 


LETTER    II. 

LET  us  suppose,  now,  that  you  should  move,  in  the  Senate,  a 
resolution  looking  to  the  establishment  of  the  exclusive  right  of 
making  known  the  facts,  or  ideas,  that  might  be  brought  to  light, 
and  see  what  would  be  the  effect.  You  would,  as  I  think,  find 
yourself  at  once  surrounded  by  the  gentlemen  who  dress  up  those 
facts  and  ideas,  and  issue  them  in  the  form  of  books.  The  geog- 
rapher would  say  to  you :  "  My  dear  sir,  this  will  never  do.  Look 
at  my  book,  and  you  will  see  that  it  is  drawn  altogether  from  the 
works  of  others,  many  of  whom  have  sunk  their  fortunes,  while 
others  have  lost  their  lives,  in  pursuit  of  the  knowledge  that  I 
so  cheaply  give  the  world.  You  will  find  there  the  essence  of 
the  works  of  Humboldt,  and  of  Wilkes.  All  of  Franklin's  dis- 
coveries are  there,  and  I  am  now  waiting  only  for  the  appear- 
ance of  McClure's  voyage  in  the  Arctic  regions  to  give  a  new 
edition  of  my  book.  Reflect,  I  beseech  you,  upon  what  you  are 


26  INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT. 

about  to  do.  Very  few  persons  have  leisure  to  read,  or  means 
to  pay  for  the  books  of  these  travellers.  'A  few  hundred  copies 
are  sufficient  to  satisfy  the  demand,  and  then  their  works  die  out. 
Of  mine,  on  the  contrary,  the  sale  is  ten,  fifteen,  or  twenty  thou- 
sand annually,  and  thus  is  knowledge  disseminated  throughout  the 
world,  enabling  the  men  who  furnish  me  with  facts  to  reap  a 
rich  harvest  of  never  dying  fame.  Grant  them  a  copyright  to  the 
new  ideas  they  may  supply  to  the  world,  and  at  once  you  put  a 
stop  to  the  production  of  such  books  as  mine,  to  my  great  injury 
and  to  the  loss  of  mankind  at  large.  Facts  and  ideas  are  common 
property,  and  their  owners,  the  public,  have  a  right  to  use  them  as 
they  will." 

The  historian  would  say :  "  Mr.  Senator,  if  you  persist  in  this 
course,  you  will  never  again  see  histories  like  mine.  Here  are 
hundreds  of  people  scattered  over  the  country,  industriously  en- 
gaged in  disinterring  facts  relating  to  our  early  history.  They  are 
enthusiasts,  and  many  of  them  are  very  poor.  Some  of  them  con- 
trive to  publish,  in  the  form  of  books,  the  results  of  their  re- 
searches, while  others  give  them  to  the  newspapers,  or  to  the 
historical  societies,  and  thus  they  are  enabled  to  come  before  the 
world.  Few  people  buy  such  things,  and  it  not  unfrequently 
happens  that  men  who  have  spent  their  lives  in  the  collection  of 
important  facts,  waste  much  of  their  small  means  in  giving  them 
to  an  ungrateful  nation.  Nevertheless,  they  have  their  reward 
in  the  consciousness  that  they  are  thus  enabling  others  to  fur- 
nish the  world  with  accurate  histories  of  their  country.  I  find 
them  of  infinite  use.  They  are  my  hewers  of  wood  and  drawers 
of  water,  and  they  never  look  for  payment  for  their  labor.  De- 
prive me  of  their  services,  and  I  shall  be  obliged  to  abandon  the 
production  of  books,  and  return  to  the  labors  of  my  profession  — 
and  they  will  be  deprived  of  fame,  while  the  public  will  be  de- 
prived of  knowjedge." 

The  medical  writer  would  say  :  "  Mr.  Senator,  should  you  suc- 
ceed in  carrying  out  the  idea  with  which  you  have  commenced, 
you  will,  I  fear,  be  the  cause  of  great  injury  to  our  profession,  and 
probably  of  great  loss  of  life,  for  you  will  thereby  arrest  the  dis- 
semination of  knowledge.  We  have,  here  and  abroad,  thousands 
of  industrious  and  thoughtful  men,  more  intent  upon  doing  good 
than  upon  pecuniary  profit,  who  give  themselves  to  the  study  of 
particular  diseases,  furnishing  the  results  to  our  journals,  and  not 


INTEKNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT.  27 

unfrequently  publishing  monographs  of  the  highest  value.  The 
sale  of  these  is  always  small,  and  their  publication  not  unfre- 
quently  makes  heavy  drafts  on  the  small  means  of  their  authors. 
Such  men  are  of  infinite  use  to  me,  for  it  is  by  aid  of  their  most 
valuable  labors  that  I  have  found  myself  enabled  to  prepare  the 
numerous  and  popular  works  that  I  have  given  to  the  world. 
Look  at  them.  There  are  several  volumes  of  each,  of  which  I  sell 
thousands  annually,  to  my  great  profit.  Deprive  me  of  the  power 
to  avail  myself  of  the  brains  of  the  working  men  of  the  profession 
and  my  books  will  soon  cease  to  be  of  any  value,  and  I  shall  lose 
the  large  income  now  realized  from  them,  while  the  public  will 
suffer  in  their  health  by  reason  of  the  increased  difficulty  of  dis- 
seminating information." 

The  professor  would  ask  you  to  look  at  his  lectures  and  satisfy 
yourself  that  they  contained  no  single  idea  that  had  originated 
with  himself.  "  How,"  he  would  ask,  "  could  these  valuable  lec- 
tures have  been  produced,  had  I  been  deprived  of  the  power  to 
avail  myself  of  the  facts  collected  by  the  working-men,  and  the 
principles  deduced  from  them  by  the  thinkers  of  the  world  ?  I  have 
no  leisure  to  collect  facts  or  analyze  them.  For  many  years  past, 
these  lectures  have  yielded  me  a  large  income,  and  so  will  they 
continue  ,to  do,  provided  I  be  allowed  to  do  in  future  as  in  time 
past  I  have  done,  appropriate  to  my  own  use  all  the  new  facts  and 
new  ideas  I  meet  with,  crediting  their  authors  or  not  as  I  find  it 
best  to  suit  my  purpose.  Abandon  your  idea,  my  dear  sir  ;  it  can- 
not be  carried  out.  The  men  who  work,  and  the  men  who  think, 
must  content  themselves  with  fame,  and  be  thankful  if  the  men 
who  write  books  and  deliver  lectures  do  not  appropriate  to  them- 
selves the  entire  credit  of  the  facts  they  use,  and  the  ideas  they 
borrow." 

The  teacher  of  natural  science  would  say :  "  My  friend,  have 
you  reflected  on  what  you  are  about  to  do  ?  Look  at  our  collec- 
tions, and  see  how  they  have  been  enlarged  within  the  last  half 
century.  Asia  and  Africa,  and  the  islands  of  the  Southern  Ocean, 
have  been  traversed  by  indefatigable  men  who,  at  the  hazard  of 
life,  and  often  at  the  cost  of  fortune,  have  quadrupled  our  knowl- 
edge of  vegetable  and  animal  life.  Such  men  do  not  ask  for  com- 
pensation of  any  kind.  They  are  willing  to  work  for  nothing. 
Why,  then,  not  let  them  ?  Look  at  the  vas.t  contributions  to  geo- 
logical knowledge  that  have  been  made  throughout  the  Union  by 


28  INTERNATIONAL   COPYRIGHT. 

men  who  were  content  witli  a  bare  support,  and  glad  to  have  the 
results  of  their  labors  published,  as  they  have  been,  at  the  public 
cost.  Such  men  ask  no  copyright.  When  they  publish,  it  is  al- 
most always  at  a  loss.  Wilson  lived  and  died  poor.  So  did 
Audubon,  to  whose  labors  we  are  indebted  for  so  much  ornitholog- 
ical knowledge.  Morton  expended  a  large  sum  in  the  preparation 
and  publication  of  his  work  on  crania.  Agassiz  did  the  same  with 
his  great  work  on  fishes.  Cuvier  had  nothing  but  fame  to  be- 
queath to  his  family.  Lamarck's  great  work  on  the  invertebratee 
sold  so  slowly  that  very  many  years  elapsed  before  the  edition  was 
exhausted ;  but  he  would  have  found  his  reward  had  he  lived  to 
see  his  ideas  appropriated  without  acknowledgment,  and  re- 
clothed  by  the  author  of  '  Vestiges  of  Creation,'  of  which  the  sale 
has  been  so  large.  This,  my  friend,  is  the  use  for  which  such  men 
as  Lamarck  and  Cuvier  were  intended.  They  collect  and  classify 
the  facts,  and  we  popularize  them  to  our  own  profit.  Look  at  my 
works  and  see,  bulky  as  they  are,  how  many  editions  have  been 
printed,  and  think  how  profitable  they  must  have  been  to  the  pub- 
lisher and  myself.  Look  further,  and  see  how  numerous  are  the 
books  to  which  my  labors  have  indirectly  given  birth.  See  the 
many  school-books  in  relation  to  botany  and  other  departments  of 
natural  science,  the  authors  of  which  know  little  of  what  they  un- 
dertake to  teach,  except  what  they  have  drawn  from  me  and  others 
like  myself.  Again,  see  how  numerous  are  the  'Flora's  Em- 
blems' and  the  '  Garlands  of  Flowers,'  and  the  '  Flora's  Diction- 
aries,' and  how  large  is  their  sale  —  and  how  large  must  be  the 
profits  of  those  engaged  in  their  production.  To  recognize  in 
such  men  as  Cuvier  and  'Lamarck  the  existence  of  any  right  to 
either  their  facts  or  their  deductions  would  be  an  act  of  great  in- 
justice towards  the  race  of  literary  men,  while  most  inexpedient 
as  regards  the  world  at  large,  now  so  cheaply  supplied  with  knowl- 
edge. As  regards  the  question  of  international  copyright  now 
before  the  Senate,  my  views  are  different.  Several  of  my  books 
have  been  published  abroad,  and  my  publisher  here  tells  me,  that 
to  prevent  the  republication  of  others  he  is  obliged  to  supply  them 
cheaply  for  foreign  markets,  and  thus  am  I  deprived  of  a  fair  and 
just  reward  for  my  labors.  Copyright  should  be  universal  and 
eternal,  and  such,  I  am  persuaded,  will  be  the  result  at  which  you 
will  arrive  when  you  shall  have  thoroughly  studied  the  subject." 
Having  studied  it,  and  having  given  full  consideration  to  the 


INTERNATIONAL   COPYRIGHT.  29 

views  that  they  and  others  had  presented,  your  answer  would 
probably  be  to  the  following  effect :  «  It  is  clear,  gentlemen,  from 
your  own  showing,  that  there  are  two  distinct  classes  of  persons 
engaged  in  the  production  of  books  —  the  men  who  furnish  the 
body,  and  those  who  dress  it  up  for  production  before  the  world. 
The  first  class  are  generally  poor,  and  likely  to  continue  so.  They 
labor  without  any  view  to  pecuniary  advantage.  They  are,  too, 
very  generally  helpless.  Animated  to  their  work  solely  by  a  de- 
sire to  penetrate  into  the  secrets  of  nature  the  character  of  their 
minds  unfits  them  for  mixing  in  a  money-getting  world,  while  you 
are  always  in  that  world,  ready  to  enforce  your  claims  to  its  con- 
sideration. As  a  consequence  of  this,  they  are  rarely  allowed 
even  the  credit  that  is  due  to  them.  Their  discoveries  become  at 
once  common  property,  to  be  used  by  men  like  yourselves,  and  for 
your  own  individual  profit.  We  have  here  among  ourselves  a 
gentleman  who  has  given  to  astronomy  a  new  and  highly  impor- 
tant law  essential  to  the  perfection  of  the  science,  the  discovery  of 
which  has  cost  him  the  labor  of  a  life,  as  a  consequence  of  which  he 
is  poor  and  likely  so  to  remain.  Important  as  was  his  discovery, 
his  name  is  already  so  completely  forgotten  that  there  is  probably 
not  a  single  one  among  you  that  can  now  recall  it,  and  yet  his  law 
figures  in  all  the  recent  books.  Is  this  right  ?  Has  he  no  claim 
to  consideration  ? 

"  In  answer,  you  will  say,  that  '  to  admit  the  existence  of  any 
such  rights  is  not  only  impossible,  but  inexpedient,  even  were  it 
possible.  Knowledge  advances  by  slow  and  almost  imperceptible 
steps,  and  each  is  but  the  precursor  of  a  new  and  more  important 
one.  Were  each  discoverer  of  a  new  truth  to  be  authorized  to 
monopolize  the  teaching  of  it  millions  of  men,  to  whom,  by  our 
aid,  it  is  communicated,  would  remain  in  ignorance  of  it,  and  thus 
would  farther  advance  be  prevented.  In  all  times  past,  such 
truths  have  been  regarded  as  common  property  ;  and  so,'  you  will 
add,  '  they  must  continue  to  be  regarded.  Rely  upon  it,  the  best 
interests  of  society  require  that  such  shall  continue  to  be  the  case, 
however  great  the  apparent  injustice  to  the  discoverer.' 

"  Here,  you  will  observe,  you  waive  altogether  the  question  of 
right  which  you  so  strongly  enforce  in  regard  to  yourselves.  It 
may  be  that  you  have  reason ;  but  if  so,  how  do  you  yourselves 
stand  in  your  relations  with  the  great  mass  of  human  beings  whose 
right  to  this  common  property  is  equal  with  your  own  ?  For  thou- 


30  INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT. 

sands  of  years  working  men,  collectors  of  facts  and  philosophers, 
have  been  contributing  to  the  common  stock,  and  the  treasure 
accumulated  is  now  enormously  great ;  and  yet  the  mass  of  man- 
kind remain  still  ignorant,  and  are  poor,  depraved,  and  wretched, 
because  ignorant.  Under  such  circumstances,  justice  would  seem 
to  require  of  the  legislator  that  he  should  sanction  no  measure 
tending  to  throw  unnecessary  difficulty  in  the  way  of  the  dissemi- 
nation of  knowledge.  To  do  so,  would  be  to  deprive  the  many  of 
the  power  to  profit  by  their  interest  in  the  common  property.  To 
do  so,  would  be  to  deprive  the  men  who  have  contributed  to  the 
accumulation  of  this  treasure  of  even  the  reward  to  which,  as  you 
admit,  they  justly  may  make  a  claim.  If  they  are  to  be  satisfied 
with  fame,  we  must  do  nothing  tending  to  limit  the  dissemination 
of  their  ideas,  because  to  do  so  would  be  to  limit  their  power  to 
acquire  fame.  If  they  are  to  be  satisfied  with  the  idea  of  doing 
good  to  their  fellow-men,  we  must  avoid  every  thing  tending  to 
limit  the  knowledge  of  their  discoveries,  because  to  do  so  would 
be  to  deprive  them  of  much  of  their  small  reward.  The  state  of 
the  matter  is,  as  I  conceive,  as  follows :  On  one  side  of  you  stand 
the  contributors  to  the  vast  treasure  of  knowledge  that  mankind 
has  accumulated,  and  is  accumulating  —  men  who  have,  in  gen- 
eral, labored  without  fee  or  reward ;  on  the  other  side  of  you 
stand  the  owners  of  this  vast  treasure,  desirous  to  have  it  fashioned 
in  a  manner  to  suit  their  various  tastes  and  powers,  that  all  may 
be  enabled  to  profit  by  its  possession.  Between  them  stand  your- 
selves, middlemen  between  the  producers  and  the  consumers.  It 
is  your  province  to  combine  the  facts  and  ideas,  as  does  the  manu- 
facturer when  he  takes  the  raw  materials  of  cloth,  and,  by  the  aid 
of  the  skill  of  numerous  working  men,  past  and  present,  elaborates 
them  into  the  beautiful  forms  that  so  much  gratify  our  eyes  in 
passing  through  the  Crystal  Palace.  For  this  service  you  are  to 
be  paid ;  but  to  enable  you  to  receive  payment  you  need  the  aid 
of  the  legislator,  as  the  common  law  grants  no  more  copyright  for 
the  form  in  which  ideas  are  expressed  than  for  the  ideas  them- 
selves. In  granting  this  aid  he  is  required  to  see  that,  while  he 
secures  that  you  have  justice,  he  does  no  injustice  to  the  men  who 
produce  the  raw  material  of  your  books,  nor  to  the  community 
whose  common  property  it  is.  In  granting  it,  he  is  bound  to  use 
his  efforts  to  attain  the  knowledge  needed  for  enabling  him  to  do 
justice  to  all  parties,  and  not  to  you  alone.  The  laws  which  «Jse- 


INTERNATIONAL   COPYRIGHT.  31 

where  govern  the  distribution  of  the  proceeds  of  labor,  must  apply 
in  your  case  with  equal  force.  Looking  at  them,  we  see  that,  with 
the  growth  of  population  and  of  wealth,  there  is  everywhere  a 
tendency  to  diminution  in  the  proportion  of  the  product  that  is 
allowed  to  the  men  who  stand  between  the  producer  and  the  con- 
sumer. In  new  settlements,  trade  is  small  and  the  shopkeeper 
requires  large  profits  to  enable  him  to  live ;  and,  while  the  con- 
sumer pays  a  high  price,  the  producer  is  compelled  to  be  content 
with  a  low  one.  In  new  settlements,  the  miller  takes  a  large  toll 
for  the  conversion  of  corn  into  flour,  and  the  spinner  and  weaver 
take  a  large  portion  of  the  wool  as  their  reward  for  converting  the 
balance  into  cloth.  Nevertheless,  the  shopkeeper,  the  miller,  the 
spinner,  and  the  weaver  are  poor,  because  trade  is  small.  As 
wealth  and  population  grow,  we  find  the  shopkeeper  gradually  re- 
ducing his  charge,  until  from  fifty  it  falls  to  five  per  cent. ;  the 
miller  reducing  his,  until  he  finds  that  he  can  afford  to  give  all 
the  flour  that  is  yielded  by  the  corn,  retaining  for  himself  the 
bran  alone  ;  and  the  spinner  and  weaver  contenting  himself  with  a 
constantly  diminishing  proportion  of  the  wool ;  and  now  it  is  that 
we  find  shopkeepers,  millers,  and  manufacturers  grow  rich,  while 
consumers  are  cheaply  supplied  because  of  the  vast  increase  of 
trade.  In  your  case,  however,  the  course  of  proceeding  has  been 
altogether  different.  Half  a  century  since,  when  our  people  were 
but  four  millions  in  number,  and  were  poor  and  scattered,  gentle- 
men like  you  were  secured  in  the  monopoly  of  their  works  for 
fourteen  years,  with  a  power  of  renewal  for  a  similar  term.  Twenty 
years  since,  when  the  population  had  almost  tripled,  and  their 
wealth  had  sixfold  increased,  and  when  the  facilities  of  distribution 
had  vastly  grown,  the  term  was  fixed  at  twenty-eight  years,  with 
renewal  to  widow  or  children  for  fourteen  years  more.  At  the 
present  moment,  you  are  secured  in  a  monopoly  for  forty-two 
years,  among  a  population  of  twenty-six  millions  of  people,  certain, 
at  the  close  of  twenty  years  more,  to  be  fifty  millions  and  likely, 
at  the  close  of  another  half  century,  to  be  a  hundred  millions,  and 
with  facilities,  for  the  disposal  of  your  products,  growing  at  a  rate 
unequaled  in  the  world.  With  this  vast  increase  of  market,  and 
increase  of  power  over  that  market,  the  consumer  should  be  sup- 
plied more  cheaply  than  in  former  times ;  yet  such  is  not  the  case. 
The  novels  of  Mrs.  Rowson  and  Charles  B.  Brown,  and  the  his- 
torical works"  of  Dr.  Ramsay,  persons  who  then  stood  in  the  first 


32  INTERNATIONAL   COPYRIGHT. 

rank  of  authors,  sold  as  cheaply  as  do  now  the  works  of  Fanny 
Fern,  the  '  Reveries '  of  Ik  Marvel,  or  the  history  of  Mr.  Bancroft ; 
and  yet,  in  the  period  that  has  since  elapsed,  the  cost  of  publica- 
tion has  fallen  probably  twenty-five  per  cent.  We  have  here  an 
inversion  of  the  usual  order  of  things,  and  it  is  with  these  facts 
before  us  that  you  claim  to  have  your  monopoly  extended  over  an- 
other thirty  millions  of  people  ;  in  consideration  of  which,  our 
people  are  to  grant  to  the  authors  of  foreign  countries  a  monopoly 
of  the  privilege  of  supplying  them  with  books  produced  abroad. 
This  application  strikes  me  as  unwise.  It  tends  to  produce  in- 
quiry, and  that  will,  probably,  in  its  turn,  lead  rather  to  a  reduc- 
tion than  an  extension  of  your  privileges.  Can  it  be  supposed 
that  when,  but  a  few  years  hence,  our  population  shall  have  at- 
tained a  height  of  fifty  millions,  with  a  demand  for  books  probably 
ten  times  greater  than  at  present,  the  community  will  be  willing  to 
continue  to  you  a  monopoly,  during  forty-two  years,  of  the  right 
of  presenting  a  body  that  is  common  property,  as  compensation 
for  putting  it  in  a  new  suit  of  clothing  ?  I  doubt  it  much,  and 
would  advise  you,  for  your  own  good,  to  be  content  with  what  you 
have.  JEsop  tells  us  that  the  dog  lost  his  piece  of  meat  in  the 
attempt  to  seize  a  shadow,  and  such  may  prove  to  be  the  case  on 
this  occasion.  So,  too,  may  it  be  with  the  owners  of  patents. 
The  discoverers  of  principles  receive  nothing,  but  those  who  apply 
them  enjoy  a  monopoly  created  by  law  for  their  use.  Everybody 
uses  chloroform,  but  nobody  pays  its  discoverer.  The  man  who 
taught  us  how  to  convert  India  rubber  into  clothing  has  not  been 
allowed  even  fame,  while  our  courts  are  incessantly  occupied  with 
the  men  who  make  the  clothing.  Patentees  and  producers  of 
books  are  incessantly  pressing  upon  Congress  with  claims  for  en- 
largement of  their  privileges,  and  are  thus  producing  the  effect  of 
inducing  an  inquiry  into  the  validity  of  their  claim  to  what  they 
now  enjoy.  Be  content,  my  friends  ;  do  not  risk  the  loss  of  a  part 
of  what  you  have  in  the  effort  to  obtain  more." 

The  question  is  often  asked :  Why  should  a  man  not  have  the 
same  claim  to  the  perpetual  enjoyment  of  his  book  that  his  neigh- 
bor has  in  regard  to  the  house  he  has  built  ?  The  answer  is,  that 
the  rights  of  the  parties  are  entirely  different.  The  man  who 
builds  a  house  quarries  the  stone  and  makes  the  bricks  of  which 
it  is  composed,  or  he  pays  another  for  doing  it  for  him.  When 
finished,  his  house  is  all,  materials  and  workmanship,  his  own. 


INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT.  33 

The  man  who  makes  a  book  uses  the  common  property  of  man- 
kind, and  all  he  furnishes  is  the  workmanship.  Society  permits 
him  to  use  its  property,  but  it  is  on  condition  that,  after  a  certain 
time,  the  whole  shall  become  part  of  the  common  stock.  To 
find  a  parallel  case,  let  it  be  supposed  that  liberal  men  should,  out 
of  their  earnings,  place  at  the  disposal  of  the  people  of  your  town 
stone,  bricks,  and  lumber,  in  quantity  sufficient  to  find  accommo- 
dation for  hundreds  of  people  that  were  unable  to  provide  for 
themselves ;  next  suppose  that  in  this  state  of  things  your  author- 
ities should  say  to  any  man  or  men,  "  Take  these  materials,  and 
procure  lime  in  quantity  sufficient  to  build  a  house ;  employ  car- 
penters, bricklayers,  and  architects,  and  then,  in  consideration  of 
having  found  the  lime  and  the  workmanship,  you  shall  have  a 
right  to  charge  your  own  price  to  every  person  who  may,  for  all 
times,  desire  to  occupy  a  room  in  it " ;  would  this  be  doing  justice 
to  the  men  who  had  given  the  raw  materials  for  public  use? 
Would  it  be  doing  justice  to  the  community  by  which  they  had 
been  given  ?  Would  it  not,  on  the  contrary,  be  the  height  of  in- 
justice? Unquestionably  it  would,  and  it  would  raise  a  storm 
that  would  speedily  displace  the  men  who  had  thus  abused  their 
trust.  Their  successors  would  then  say  :  "  Messrs. ,  our  pre- 
decessors, did  what  they  had  no  right  to  do.  These  materials  are 
common  property.  They  were  given  without  fee  or  reward,  with 
a  view  to  benefit  the  whole  people  of  our  town,  many  of  whom  are 
badly  accommodated,  while  others  are  heavily  taxed  for  helping 
those  who  are  unable  to  help  themselves.  To  carry  out  the  views 
of  the  benevolent  men  to  whom  we  are  indebted  for  all  these  stone, 
bricks,  and  lumber,  they  must  remain  common  property.  You 
may,  if  you  will,  convert  them  into  a  house,  and,  in  consideration 
of  the  labor  and  skill  required  for  so  doing,  we  will  grant  you, 
during  a  certain  time,  the  privilege  of  letting  the  rooms,  at  your 
own  price,  to  those  who  desire  to  occupy  them ;  but  at  the  close 
of  that  time  the  building  must  become  common  property,  to  be 
disposed  of  as  we  please."  This  is  exactly  what  the  community 
says  to  the  gentlemen  who  employ  themselves  in  converting  its 
common  property  into  books,  and  to  say  more  would  be  doing 
great  injustice. 

The  length  of  time  for  which  the  building  should  be  thus 
granted  would  depend  upon  the  number  of  persons  that  would  be 
likely  to  use  the  rooms,  and  the  prices  they  would  be  willing  to 


34  INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT. 

pay.  If  lodgers  were  likely  to  be  few  and  poor,  a  long  time  would 
be  required  to  be  given ;  but  if,  on  the  contrary,  the  community 
were  so  great  and  prosperous  as  to  render  it  certain  that  all  the 
rooms  would  be  occupied  every  day  in  the  year,  and  at  such  prices 
as  would  speedily  repay  the  labor  and  skill  that  had  been  required, 
the  time  allowed  would  be  short.  Here,  as  we  see,  the  course  of 
things  would  be  entirely  different  from  that  which  is  observed  in 
regard  to  books,  the  monopoly  of  which  has  increased  in  length 
with  the  growth,  in  wealth  and  number,  of  the  consumers,  and  is 
now  attempted,  by  the  aid  of  international  copyright,  to  be  ex- 
tended over  millions  of  men  who  are  yet  exempt  from  its  opera- 
tion. 

The  people  of  this  country  own  a  vast  quantity  of  wild  land, 
which  by  slow  degrees  acquires  a  money  value,  that  value  being 
due  to  the  contributions  of  thousands  and  tens  of  thousands  of 
people  who  are  constantly  making  roads  towards  them,  and  thus 
facilitating  the  exchange  of  such  commodities  as  may  be  raised 
from  them.  These  lands  are  common  property,  but  the  whole 
body  of  their  owners  has  agreed  that  whenever  any  one  of  their 
number  desires  to  purchase  out  the  interest  of  his  partners  he 
may  do  so  at  $1.25  per  acre.  They  do  not  give  him  any  of  the 
common  property  ;  they  require  him  to  purchase  and  pay  for  it. 

"With  authors  they  pursue  a  more  liberal  course.  They  say : 
"  We  have  extensive  fields  in  which  hundreds  of  thousands  of  men 
have  labored  for  many  centuries.  They  were  at  first  wild  lands, 
as  wild  as  those  of  the  neighborhood  of  the  Rocky  Mountains,  but 
this  vast  body  of  laborers  has  felled  the  trees  and  drained  the 
swamps,  and  has  thus  removed  nearly  all  the  difficulties  that  stood 
opposed  to  profitable  cultivation.  They  have  also  opened  mines 
of  incalculable  richness ;  mines  of  gold,  silver,  lead,  copper,  iron, 
and  other  metals,  and  all  of  these  are  common  property.  The 
men  who  executed  these  important  works  were  our  slaves,  ill  fed, 
worse  clothed,  and  still  worse  lodged;  and. thousands  of  the  most 
laborious  and  useful  of  them  have  perished  of  disease  and  starva- 
tion. Great  as  are  the  improvements  already  made,  their  number 
is  constantly  increasing,  for  we  continue  to  employ  such  slaves  — 
active,  intelligent,  and  useful  men  —  in  extending  them,  and 
scarcely  a  day  elapses  that  does  not  bring  to  light  some  new  dis- 
covery, tending  greatly  to  increase  the  value  of  our  common  prop- 
erty. We  invite  you,  gentlemen,  to  come  and  cultivate  these  lands 


INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT.  35 

and  work  these  mines.  They  are  free  to  all.  During  the  long 
period  of  forty-two  years  you  shall  have  the  whole  product  of  your 
labor,  and  all  we  shall  ask  of  you,  at  the  close  of  that  period,  will 
be  that  you  leave  behind  the  common  property  of  which  we  are 
now  possessed,  increased  by  the  addition  of  such  machinery  as 
you  may  yourselves  have  made.  The  corn  that  you  may  have  ex- 
tracted, and  the  gold  and  silver  that  you  may  have  mined  during 
that  long  period,  will  be  the  property  of  yourselves,  your  wives, 
and  your  children.  "We  charge  no  rent  for  the  use  of  the  lands, 
no  wages  for  the  labor  of  our  slaves."  Not  satisfied  with  this, 
however,  the  persons  who  work  these  rich  fields  and  mines  claim 
to  be  absolute  owners,  not  only  of  all  the  gold  and  silver  they  ex- 
tract, but  of  all  the  machinery  they  construct  out  of  the  common 
property  ;  and  out  of  this  claim  grows  the  treaty  now  before  the 
Senate. 

If  justice  requires  the  admission  of  foreigners  to  the  enjoyment 
of  a  monopoly  of  the  sale  of  their  books  it  should  be  conceded  at 
once  to  all,  and  it  should  be  declared  that  no  book  should  be 
printed  here  without  the  consent  of  its  author,  let  him  be  English- 
man, Frenchman,  German,  Russian,  or  Hindoo.  This  would  cer- 
tainly greatly  increase  the  difficulty  now  existing  in  relation  to  the 
dissemination  of  knowledge  ;  but  if  justice  does  require  it  let  it  be 
done.  Would  it,  however,  benefit  the  men  who  have  real  claims 
on  our  consideration  ?  Let  us  see.  A  German  devotes  his  life  to 
the  study  of  the  history  of  his  country,  and  at  length  produces  a 
work  of  great  value,  but  of  proportional  size.  Real  justice  says 
that  his  work  may  not  be  used  without  his  permission ;  that  the 
facts  he  has  brought  to  light  from  among  the  vast  masses  of  orig- 
inal documents  he  has  examined  are  his  property,  and  can  be  pub- 
lished by  none  others  but  himself.  The  legislation,  whose  aid  is 
invoked  in  the  name  of  justice  by  literary  men,  speaks,  however,, 
very  differently.  It  says :  "  This  work  is  very  cumbrous.  To 
establish  his  views  this  man  has  gone  into  great  detail.  If  trans- 
lated, his  book  will  scarcely  sell  to  such  extent  as  to  pay  the  labor. 
The  facts  are  common  property.  Out  of  this  book  you  can  make 
one  that  will  be  much  more  readable,  and  that  will  sell,  for  it  will 
not  be  of  more  than  one  third  the  size.  Take  it,  then,  and  extract 
all  you  need,  and  you  will  do  well.  You  will  have,  too,  another 
advantage.  Translation  confers  no  reputation ;  but  an  original 
work,  such  as  I  now  recommend  to  you,  will  give  you  such  a  stand- 


36  INTERNATIONAL   COPYRIGHT. 

ing  as  may  lead  you  on  to  fortune.  Few  people  know  any  thing 
of  the  original  work,  and  it  will  not  be  necessary  for  you  to  men- 
tion that  all  your  materials  are  thence  derived."  On  the  other 
hand,  a  lady  who  has  read  the  work  of  this  poor  German  finds  in 
it  an  episode  that  she  expands  into  a  novel,  which  sells  rapidly, 
and  she  reaps  at  home  a  large  reward  for  her  labors ;  while  the 
man  who  gave  her  the  idea  starves  in  a  garret.  A  literary  friend 
of  the  lady  novelist,  delighted  with  her  success,  finds  in  his  coun- 
trywoman's treasury  of  facts  the  material  for  a  poem  out  of  which 
he,  too,  reaps  a  harvest.  Both  of  these  are  protected  by  interna- 
tional copyright,  because  they  have  furnished  nothing  but  the  clothing 
of  ideas ;  but  the  man  who  supplied  them  with  the  ideas  finds 
that  his  book  is  condensed  abroad,  and  given  to  the  public,  per- 
haps, without  even  the  mention  of  his  name. 

The  whole  tendency  of  the  existing  system  is  to  give  the  largest 
reward  to  those  whose  labors  are  lightest,  and  the  smallest  to  those 
whose  labors  are  most  severe ;  and  every  extension  of  it  must 
necessarily  look  in  that  direction.  The  "  Mysteries  of  Paris  "  were 
a  fortune  to  Eugene  Sue,  and  "  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin  "  has  been  one 
to  Mrs.  Stowe.  Byron  had  2,000  guineas  for  a  volume  of  "  Childe 
Harold,"  and  Moore  3,000  for  his  "  Lalla  Rookh; "  and  yet  a  single 
year  should  have  more  than  sufficed  for  the  production  of  any  one 
of  them.  Under  a  system  of  international  copyright,  Dumas, 
already  so  largely  paid,  would  be  protected,  whereas  Thierry,  who 
sacrificed  his  sight  to  the  gratification  of  his  thirst  for  knowledge, 
would  not.  Humboldt,  the  philosopher  par  excellence  of  the  age, 
would  not,  because  he  furnishes  his  readers  with  things,  and  not 

/  O     J 

with  words  alone.  Of  the  books  that  record  his  observations  on 
this  continent,  but  a  part  has,  I  believe,  been  translated  into  Eng- 
lish, and  of  these  but  a  small  portion  has  been  republished  in  this 
country,  although  to  be  had  without  claim  for  copyright.  In 
England  their  sale  has  been  small,  and  can  have  done  little  more 
than  pay  the  cost  of  translation  and  publication.  Had  it  been  re- 
quired to  pay  for  the  privilege  of  translation,  but  a  small  part  of 
even  those  which  have  been  republished  would  probably  have  ever 
seen  the  light  in  any  but  the  language  of  the  author.  This  great 
man  inherited  a  handsome  property  which  he  devoted  to  the  ad- 
vancement of  science,  and  what  has  been  his  pecuniary  reward 
may  be  seen  in  the  following  statement,  derived  from  an  address 
recently  delivered  in  New  York : — 


INTERNATIONAL   COPYRIGHT.  37 

"  There  are  now  living  in  Europe  two  very  distinguished  men,  barons,  both  very 
eminent  in  their  line,  both  known  to  the  whole  civilized  world;  one  is  Baron  Roths- 
child, and  the  other  Baron  Humboldt;  one  distinguished  for  the  accumulation  of 
•wealth,  the  other  for  the  accumulation  of  knowledge.  What  are  the  possessions  of 
the  philosopher?  Why,  sir,  I  heard  a  gentleman  whom  I  have  seen  here  this  after- 
noon, say  that,  on  a  recent  visit  to  Europe,  he  paid  his  respects  to  that  distinguished 
philosopher,  and  was  admitted  to  an  audience.  He  found  him,  at  the  age  of  84 
years,  fresh  and  vigorous,  in  a  small  room,  nicely  sanded,  with  a  large  deal  table 
uncovered  in  the  midst  of  that  room,  containing  his  books  and  writing  apparatus. 
Adjoining  this,  was  a  small  bed-room,  in  which  he  slept.  Here  this  eminent  philoso- 
pher received  a  visitor  from  the  United  States.  He  conversed  with  him ;  he  spoke 
of  his  works.  "  My  works,"  said  he,  "  you  will  find  in  the  adjoining  library,  but  I 
am  too  poor  to  own  a  copy  of  them.  1  have  not  the  means  to  buy  a  full  copy  of  my 
own  works." 

After  having  furnished  to  the  gentlemen  who  produce  books 
more  of  the  material  of  which  books  are  composed  than  has  ever 
been  furnished  by  any  other  man,  this  illustrious  man  finds  him- 
self, at  the  close  of  life,  altogether  dependent  on  the  bounty  of  the 
Prussian  government,  which  allows  him,  as  I  have  heard,  less  than 
five  hundred  dollars  a  year.  In  what  manner,  now,  would  Hum- 
boldt be  benefited  by  international  copyright  ?  I  know  of  none ; 
but  it  is  very  plain  to  see  that  Dumas,  Victor  Hugo,  and  George 
Sand,  might  derive  from  it  immense  revenues.  In  confirmation  of 
this  view,  I  here  ask  you  to  review  the  names  of  the  persons  who 
urge  most  anxiously  the  change  of  system  that  is  now  proposed, 
and  see  if  you  can  find  in  it  the  name  of  a  single  man  who  has 
done  any  thing  to  extend  the  domain  of  knowledge.  I  think  you 
will  not.  Next  look  and  see  if  you  do  not  find  in  it  the  names  of 
those  who  furnish  the  world  with  new  forms  of  old  ideas,  and  are 
largely  paid  for  so  doing.  The  most  active  advocate  of  interna- 
tional copyright  is  Mr.  Dickens,  who  is  said  to  realize  $70,000 
per  annum  from  the  sale  of  works  whose  composition  is  little  more 
than  amusement  for  his  leisure  hours.  In  this  country,  the  only 
attempt  that  has  yet  been  made  to  restrict  the  right  of  translation 
is  in  a  suit  now  before  the  courts,  for  compensation  for  the  privi- 
lege of  converting  into  German  a  work  that  has  yielded  the  largest 
compensation  that  the  world  has  yet  known  for  the  same  quantity 
of  literary  labor. 

We  are  constantly  told  that  regard  to  the  interests  of  science 
requires  that  we  should  protect  and  enlarge  the  rights  of  authors ; 
but  does  science  make  any  such  claim  for  herself?  I  doubt  it. 
Men  who  make  additions  to  science  know  well  that  they  have,  and 
can  have,  no  rights  whatever.  Cuvier  died  very  poor,  and  all  the 


38  INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT. 

copyright  that  could  have  been  given  to  him  or  Humboldt  would 
not  have  enriched  either  the  one  or  the  other.  Laplace  knew 
well-  that  his  great  work  could  yield  him  nothing.  Our  own 
Bowditch  translated  it  as  a  labor  of  love,  and  left  by  his  will  the 
means  required  for  its  publication.  The  gentlemen  who  advo- 
cate the  interests  of  science  are  literary  men  who  use  the  facts 
and  ideas  furnished  by  scientific  men,  paying  nothing  for  their 
use.  Now,  literature  is  a  most  honorable  profession,  and  the  gen- 
tlemen engaged  in  it  are  entitled  not  only  to  the  respect  and  con- 
sideration of  their  fellow-men,  but  also  to  the  protection  of  the 
law ;  but  in  granting  it,  the  legislator  is  bound  to  recollect,  that 
justice  to  the  men  who  furnish  the  raw  materials  of  books, 
and  justice  to  the  community  that  owns  those  raw  materials,  re- 
quire that  protection  shall  not,  either  in  point  of  space  or  time,  be 
greater  than  is  required  for  giving  the  producer  of  books  a  full 
and  fair  compensation  for  his  labor.  How  the  present  system 
operates  in  regard  to  English  and  American  authors,  I  propose  to 
consider  in  another  letter. 


LETTER    III. 

WE  are  assured  that  justice  requires  the  admission  of  foreign 
authors  to  the  privilege  of  copyright,  and  in  support  of  the  claim 
that  she  presents  are  frequently  informed  of  the  extreme  poverty 
of  many  highly  popular  English  writers.  Mrs.  Inchbald,  so  well 
known  as  author  of  the  "  Simple  Story  "  and  other  novels,  as  well 
as  in  her  capacity  of  editor,  dragged  on,  as  we  are  to\d,  to  the  age 
of  sixty,  a  miserable  existence,  living  always  in  mean  lodgings, 
and  suffering  frequently  from  want  of  the  common  comforts  of  life. 
Lady  Morgan,  so  well  known  as  Miss  Owenson,  a  brilliant  and 
accomplished  woman,  is  now  to  some  extent  dependent  upon  the 
public  charity,  administered  in  the  form  of  a  pension  of  less  than 
five  hundred  dollars  a  year.  Mrs.  Hemans,  the  universally  ad- 
mired poetess,  lived  and  died  in  poverty.  Laman  Blanchard  los< 
his  senses  and  committed  suicide  in  consequence  of  being  com- 
pelled, by  his  extreme  poverty,  to  the  effort  of  writing  an  article 
for  a  periodical  while  his  wife  lay  a  corpse  in  the  house.  Miss 
Mitford,  so  well  known  to  all  of  us,  found  herself,  after  a  life  of 
close  economy,  so  greatly  reduced  as  to  have  been  under  the  neces- 


INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT.  39 

sity  of  applying  to  her  American  readers  for  means  to  extricate 
her  little  property  from  the  rude  hands  of  the  sheriff.  Like  Lady 
Morgan,  she  is  now  a  public  pensioner.  Leigh  Hunt  is  likewise 
dependent  on  the  public  charity.  Tom  Hood,  so  well  known  by 
his  "  Song  of  a  Shirt "  —  the  delight  of  his  readers,  and  a  mine  of 
wealth  to  his  publishers;  a  man  without  vices,  and  of  untiring 
industry  —  lived  always  from  day  to  day  on  the  produce  of  his 
labor.  On  his  death-bed,  when  his  lungs  were  so  worn  with  con- 
sumption that  he  could  breathe  only  through  a  silver  tube,  he  was 
obliged  to  be  propped  up  with  pillows,  and,  with  snaking  hand  and 
dizzy  head,  force  himself  to  the  task  of  amusing  his  readers,  that 
he  might  thereby  obtain  bread  for  his  unhappy  wife  and  children. 
With  all  his  reputation,  Moore  found  it  difficult  to  support  his 
family,  and  all  the  comfort  of  his  declining  years  was  due  to  the 
charity  of  his  friend,  Lord  Lansdowne.  In  one  of  his  letters 
from  Germany,  Campbell  expresses  himself  transported  with  joy 
at  hearing  that  a  double  edition  of  his  poems  had  just  been  pub- 
lished in  London.  u  This  unexpected  fifty  pounds,"  says  he, 
"  saves  me  from  jail."  Haynes  Bayley  died  in  extreme  poverty. 
Similar  statements  are  furnished  us  in  relation  to  numerous 
others  who  have,  by  the  use  of  their  pens,  largely  contributed  to 
the  enjoyment  and  instruction  of  the  people  of  Great  Britain. 
It  wouldj  indeed,  be  difficult  to  find  very  many  cases  in  which  it 
had  been  otherwise  with  persons  exclusively  dependent  on  the 
produce  of  literary  labor.  With  few  and  brilliant  exceptions, 
their  condition  appears  to  have  been,  and  to  be,  one  of  almost 
hopeless  poverty.  Scarcely  any  thing  short  of  this,  indeed,  would 
induce  the  acceptance  of  the  public  charity  that  is  occasionally 
doled  out  in  the  form  of  pensions  on  the  literary  fund. 

This  is  certainly  an  extraordinary  state  of  things,  and  one  that 
makes  to  our  charitable  feelings  an  appeal  that  is  almost  irresisti- 
ble. Nevertheless,  before  giving  way  to  such  feelings,  it  would 
be  proper  to  examine  into  the  real  cause  of  all  this  poverty,  with 
a  view  to  satisfy  ourselves  if  real  charity  would  carry  us  in  the 
direction  now  proposed.  The  skilful  physician  always  studies  the 
cause  of  disease  before  he  determines  on  the  remedy,  and  this 
course  is  quite  as  necessary  in  prescribing  for  moral  as  for  physi- 
cal disorder.  Failing'  to  do  this,  we  might  increase  instead  of 
diminishing  the  evil,  and  might  find  at  last  that  we  had  been  tax- 
ing ourselves  in  vain. 


40  INTERNATIONAL   COPYRIGHT. 

What  is  claimed  by  English  authors  is  perpetuity  and  universal- 
ity of  property  in  the  clothing  they  supply  for  the  body  that  is  fur- 
nished to  the  world  by  other  and  unpaid  men  ;  and  an  examina- 
tion of  the  course  of  proceeding  in  that  country  for  the  last  cen- 
tury and  a  half  shows  that  each  step  that  has  been  taken  has  been 
in  that  direction.  While  denying  to  the  producers  of  facts  and 
ideas  any  right  whatsoever,  every  act  of  legislation  has  tended  to 
give  more  and  more  control  over  their  dissemination  to  men 
who  appropriated  them  to  their  own  use,  and  brought  them  in  an 
attractive  form  before  the  reader.  Early  in  the  last  century  was 
passed  an  act  well  known  as  the  Statute  of  Queen  Anne,  giving  to 
authors  fourteen  years  as  the  period  during  which  they  were  to 
have  a  monopoly  of  the  peculiar  form  of  words  they  chose  to  adopt 
in  coming  before  the  world.  The  number  of  persons  then  living 
in  England  and  Wales,  and  subjected  to  that  monopoly,  was  about 
five  millions.  Since  that  time  the  field  of  its  operation  has  been 
enlarged,  until  it  now  embraces  not  only  England  and  Wales,  but 
Scotland,  Ireland,  and  the  British  colonies,  containing  probably 
thirty-two  millions  of  people  who  use  the  English  language.  The 
time,  too,  has  been  gradually  extended  until  it  now  reaches  forty- 
two  years,  or  thrice  the  period  for  which  it  was  originally  granted. 
Nevertheless,  no  life  is  more  precarious  than  that  of  an  English- 
man dependent  upon  literary  pursuits  for  support.  Such  men  are 
almost  universally  poor,  and  leading  men  among  them,  Tennyson 
and  Sir  Francis  Head  for  instance,  gladly  accept  the  public  char- 
ity, in  the  form  of  pensions  for  less  than  five  hundred  dollars  a 
year.  This  is  not  a  consequence  of  limitation  in  the  field  of  ac- 
tion, for  that  is  six  times  greater  than  it  was  when  Gay  netted 
£1,600  from  a  single  opera,  and  Pope  received  £6,000  for  his  "Ho- 
mer ; "  five  times  greater  than  when  Fielding  had  £1,000  for  his 
"  Amelia ; "  and  four  times  more  than  when  Robertson  had  £4,500 
for  his  "  Charles  V.,"  Gibbon  £5,000  for  the  second  part  of  his 
history,  and  McPherson  £1,200  for  his  "  Ossian." 1  Since  that  time 
money  has  become  greatly  more  abundant  and  less  valuable  ;  and 
if  we  desired  to  compare  the  reward  of  these  authors  with  those 
of  the  present  day,  the  former  should  be  trebled  in  amount,  which 
would  give  Robertson  more  than  sixty  thousand  dollars  for  a  work 
that  is  comprised  in  three  8vo.  volumes  of  very  moderate  size.  It 

1  The  several  figures  here  given  are  from  a  statement  in  a  British  journal. 
Whether  they  are  perfectly  accurate,  or  not,  I  have  no  means  of  determining. 


INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT.  41 

is  not  a  consequence  of  limitation  of  time,  for  that  has  growc  from 
fourteen  to  forty-two  years  —  more  than  is  required  for  any  book 
except,  perhaps,  one  in  five  or  ten  thousand.  It  should  not  be  a 
consequence  of  poverty  in  the  nation,  for  British  writers  assure 
us  that  wealth  so  much  abounds  that  wars  are  needed  to  prevent 
its  too  rapid  growth,  and  that  foreign  loans  are  indispensable  for 
enabling  the  people  of  Britain  to  find  an  outlet  for  all  their  vast 
accumulations.  What,  then,  is  the  cause  of  disease  ?  Why  is  it 
that  in  so  wealthy  a  nation  literary  men  and  women  are  so  gen- 
erally poor  that  it  should  be  required  to  bring  their  poverty  before 
the  world,  to  aid  in  the  demand  for  an  extension  to  other  coun- 
tries of  the  monopoly  so  well  secured  at  home  ?  In  that  country 
the  fortunes  of  wealthy  men  count  by  millions,  and,  that  being 
the  case,  an  average  contribution  of  a  shilling  a  head  towards 
paying  for  the  copyright  of  books,  would  seem  to  be  the  merest 
trifle  to  be  given  in  return  for  the  pleasure  and  the  instruction  de- 
rived from  the  perusal  of  the  works  of  English  authors,  and  yet 
even  that  small  sum  does  not  appear  to  be  paid.  Thirty-two  mil- 
lions of  shillings  make  almost  eight  millions  of  dollars ;  a  sum 
sufficient  to  give  to  six  hundred  authors  more  than  thirteen  thou- 
sand dollars  a  year,  being  more  than  half  the  salary  of  the  chief 
magistrate  of  our  Union.  Admitting,  however,  that  there  were  a 
thousand  authors  worthy  to  be  paid,  and  that  would  most  certainly 
cover  them  all,  it  would  give  to  each  eight  thousand  dollars,  or 
one  third  more  than  we  have  been  accustomed  to  allow  to  men 
who  have  devoted  their  lives  to  the  service  of  the  public,  and  have 
at  length  risen  to  be  Secretaries  of  State.  If  English  authors 
were  thus  largely  paid,  it  would  be  deemed  an  absurdity  to  ask  an 
enlargement  of  their  monopoly  ;  but,  as  they  are  not  thus  paid,  it 
is  asked.  There  is  probably  but  a  single  literary  man  in  England 
that  receives  $8,000  a  year  for  his  labors,  and  it  may  be  doubted  if 
it  would  be  possible  to  name  ten  whose  annual  receipts  equal 
$6,000 ;  while  those  of  a  vast  majority  of  them  are  under  $1,500, 
and  very  many  of  them  greatly  under  it  Even  were  we  to  in- 
crease the  number  of  authors  to  fifteen  hundred,  one  to  every 
4,000  males  between  the  ages  of  20  and  60  in  the  kingdom,  and 
to  allow  them,  on  an  average,  $2,000  per  annum,  it  would  require 
but  three  millions  of  dollars  to  pay  them,  and  that  could  be  done 
by  an  average  contribution  of  five  pence  per  head  of  the  popula- 
tion, a  wonderfully  small  amount  to  be  paid  for  literary  labor  by  a 


42  INTERNATIONAL   COPYRIGHT. 

nation  claiming  to  be  the  wealthiest  in  the  world.  A  shilling  a  head 
would  give  to  the  whole  fifteen  hundred  salaries  nearly  equal  to 
those  of  our  Secretaries  ;  and  yet  we  see  clever  and  industrious 
men,  writers  of  eminence  whose  readers  are  to  be  found  in  every 
part  of  the  civilized  world,  living  on  in  hopeless  poverty,  and  dying 
with  the  knowledge  that  they  are  leaving  widows  and  children  to 
the  "  tender  mercies  "  of  a  world  in  which  they  themselves  have 
shone  and  starved.  Viewing  all  these  facts,  it  may,  I  think,  well 
be  doubted  if  the  annual  contributions  of  the  people  subject  to  the 
British  copyright  act  for  the  support  of  the  persons  who  produce 
their  books,  much  exceeds  three  pence,  or  six  cents,  per  head  ;  and 
here  it  is  that  we  are  to  find  the  real  difficulty  —  one  not  to  be 
removed  by  us.  The. home  market  is  the  important  one,  whether 
for  words  or  things,  and  when  that  is  bad  but  little  benefit  can 
be  derived  from  any  foreign  one  ;  and  every  effort  to  extend  the 
latter  will,  under  such  circumstances,  be  found  to  result  in  disap- 
pointment. It  can  act  only  as  a  plaster  to  conceal  the  sore,  while 
the  sore  itself  becomes  larger  and  more  dangerous  from  day  to 
day.  To  effect  a  cure,  the  sore  itself  must  be  examined  and  its 
cause  removed.  To  cure  the  disease  so  prevalent  among  British 
authors  we  must  first  seek  for  the  causes  why  the  home  market 
for  the  products  of  their  labor  is  so  very  small,  and  that  will  be 
found  in  the  steadily  growing  tendency  towards  centralization,  so 
obvious  in  every  part  of  the  operations  of  the  British  empire. 
Centralization  and  civilization  have  in  all  countries,  and  at  all  pe- 
riods of  the  world,  been  opposed  to  each  other,  and  that  such  is 
here  the  case  can,  I  think,  readily  be  shown. 

Among  the  earliest  cases  iu  which  this  tendency  was  exhibited 
was  that  of  the  Union  by  which  the  kingdom  of  Scotland  was  re- 
duced to  the  condition  of  a  province  of  England,  and  Edinburgh, 
from  being  the  capital  of  a  nation,  to  becoming  a  mere  provincial 
town.  By  many  and  enlightened  Scotchmen  a  federal  union 
would  have  been  preferred ;  but  a  legislative  one  was  formed,  and 
from  that  date  the  whole  public  revenue  of  Scotland  tended 
towards  London,  towards  which  tended  also,  ajid  necessarily,  all 
who  sought  for  place,  power,  or  distinction.  An  absentee  govern- 
ment produced,  of  course,  absentee  landholders,  and  with  each 
step  in  this  direction  there  was  a  diminution  in  the  demand  at 
home  for  talent,  which  thenceforward  sought  a  market  in  the  great 
city  to  which  the  rents  were  sent  The  connection  between  the 


INTERNATIONAL   COPYRIGHT.  43 

educated  classes  of  Scotland  and  the  Scottish  seats  of  learning 
tended  necessarily  to  decline,  while  the  connection  between  the 
former  and  the  universities  of  England  became  more  intimate. 
These  results  were,  of  course,  gradually  produced,  but,  as  is  the 
case  with  the  stone  as  it  falls  towards  the  earth,  the  attraction  of 
centralization  grew  with  the  growth  of  the  city  that  was  built  out 
of  the  contributions  of  distant  provinces,  while  the  counteracting 
power  of  the  latter  as  steadily  declined,  and  the  greater  the  de- 
cline the  more  rapid  does  its  progress  now  become.  Seventy 
years  after  the  date  of  the  Union,  Edinburgh  was  still  a  great  lit- 
erary capital,  and  could  then  offer  to  the  world  the  names  of  nu- 
merous men  of  whose  reputation  any  country  of  the  world  might 
have  been  proud :  Burns  arid  McPherson  ;  Robertson  and  Hume ; 
Blair  and  Kames ;  Reid,  Smith,  and  Stewart ;  Monboddo,  Playfair, 
and  Boswell ;  and  numerous  others,  whose  reputation  has  survived 
to  the  present  day.  Thirty-five  years  later,  its  press  furnished  the 
world  with  the  works  of  Jeffrey  and  Brougham ;  Stewart,  Brown, 
and  Chalmers  ;  Scott,  Wilson,  and  Joanna  Baillie ;  and  with  those  of 
many  others  whose  reputation  was  less  widely  spread,  among  whom 
were  Gait,  Hogg,  Lockhart,  and  Miss  Ferrier,  the  authoress  of 
"  Marriage."  The  "Edinburgh  Review  "-and  "  Blackwood's  Maga- 
zine," then,  to  a  great  extent,  represented  Scottish  men,  and  Scottish 
modes  of  thought.  Looking  now  on  the  same  field  of  action,  it  is 
difficult,  from  this  distance,  to  discover  more  than  two  Scottish  au- 
thors, Alison  and  Sir  William  Hamilton,  the  latter  all  "  the  more 
conspicuous  and  remarkable,  as  he  now,"  says  the  "  North  British 
Review  "  (Feb.  1853),  "  stands  so  nearly  alone  in  the  ebb  of  literary 
activity  in  Scotland,  which  has  been  so  apparent  during  this  gen- 
eration." McCulloch  and  Macaulay  were  both,  I  believe,  born  in 
Scotland,  but  in  all  else  they  are  English.  Glasgow  has  recently 
presented  the  world  with  a  new  poet,  in  the  person  of  Alexander 
Smith,  but,  unlike  Ramsay  and  Burns,  there  is  nothing  Scottish 
about  him  beyond  his  place  of  birth.  "  It  is  not,"  says  one  of  his 
reviewers,  "  Scottish  scenery,  Scottish  history,  Scottish  character, 
and  Scottish  social  humor,  that  he  represents  or  depicts.  Nor  is 
there,"  it  continues,  "  any  trace  in  him  of  that  feeling  of  intense 
nationality  so  common  in  Scottish  writers.  London,"  as  it  adds, 
"a  green  lane  in  Kent,  an  English  forest,  an  English  manor- 
house,  these  are  the  scenes  where  the  real  business  of  the  drama 

is  transacted." * 

i  North  Bntith  Rtview,  Aug.  1863. 


44  INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT. 

The  "  Edinburgh  Review  "  has  become  to  all  intents  and  pur- 
poses an  English  journal,  and  "Blackwood  "  has  lost  all  those  char- 
acteristics by  which  it  was  in  former  times  distinguished  from  the 
magazines  published  south  of  the  Tweed. 

Seeing  these  facts,  we  can  scarcely  fail  to  agree  with  the  Review 
already  quoted,  in  the  admission  that  there  are  "  probably  fewer 
leading  individual  thinkers  and  literary  guides  in  Scotland  at 
present  than  at  any  other  period  of  its  history  since  the  early  part 
of  the  last  century,"  since  the  day  when  Scotland  itself  lost  its 
individuality.  The  same  journal  informs  us  that  "  there  is  now 
scarcely  an  instance  of  a  Scotchman  holding  a  learned  position  in 
any  other  country,"  and  farther  says  that  "  the  small  number  of 
names  of  literary  Scotchmen  known  throughout  Europe  for  emi- 
nence in  literature  and  science  is  of  itself  sufficient  to  show  to 
how  great  an  extent  the  present  race  of  Scotchmen  have  lost  the 
position  which  their  ancestors  held  in  the  world  of  letters." * 

How,  indeed,  could  it  be  otherwise  ?  Centralization  tends  to 
carry  to  London  all  the  wealth  and  all  the  expenditure  of  the  king- 
dom, and  thus  to  destroy  everywhere  the  local  demand  for  books 
or  newspapers,  or  for  men  capable  of  producing  either.  Central- 
ization taxes  the  poor  people  of  the  north  of  Scotland,  and  their 
complaints  of  distress  are  answered  by  an  order  for  their  expulsion, 
that  place  may  be  made  for  sheep  and  shepherds,  neither  of  whom 
make  much  demand  for  books.  Centralization  appropriates  mil- 
lions for  the  improvement  of  London  and  the  creation  of  royal 
palaces  and  pleasure-grounds  in  and  about  that  city,  while  Holy- 
rood,  and  all  other  of  the  buildings  with  which  Scottish  history  is 
connected,  are  allowed  to  go  to  ruin.  Centralization  gives  libra- 
ries and  museums  to  London,  but  it  refuses  the  smallest  aid  to  the 
science  or  literature  of  Scotland.  Centralization  deprives  the 
people  of  the  power  to  educate  themselves,  by  drawing  from  them 
more  than  thirty  millions  of  dollars,  raised  by  taxation,  and  it 
leaves  the  professors  in  the  colleges  of  Scotland  in  the  enjoyment 
of  chairs,  the  emoluments  of  many  of  which  are  but  $1,200  per 
annum.  Whence,  then,  can  come  the  demand  for  books,  or  the 
power  to  compensate  the  people  who  make  them  ?  Not,  assured- 
ly, from  the  mass  of  unhappy  people  who  occupy  the  Highlands, 
whose  starving  condition  furnishes  so  frequent  occasion  for  the 
comments  of  their  literary  countrymen  ;  nor,  as  certainly,  from 
l  North  British  Review,  May,  1853. 


INTERNATIONAL   COPYRIGHT.  45 

the  wretched  inhabitants  of  the  wynds  of  Glasgow,  or  from  the 
weavers  of  Paisley.  Centralization  is  gradually  separating  the 
people  into  two  classes  —  the  very  rich,  who  live  in  London,  and 
the  very  poor,  who  remain  in  Scotland ;  and  with  the  progress  of 
this  division  there  is  a  gradual  decay  in  the  feeling  of  national 
pride,  that  formerly  so  much  distinguished  the  people  of  Scotland. 
The  London  "  Leader  ".tells  its  readers  that  "  England  is  a  power 
made  up  of  conquests  over  nationalities  ; "  and  it  is  right.  The 
nationality  of  Scotland  has  disappeared  ;  and,  however  much  it 
may  annoy  our  Scottish  friends1  to  have  the  energetic  and  intelli- 
gent Celt  sunk  in  the  "  slow  and  unimpressible "  Saxon,  such  is 
the  tendency  of  English  centralization,  everywhere  destructive  of 
that  national  feeling  which  is  essential  to  progress  in  civilization. 

Looking  to  Ireland,  we  find  a  similar  state  of  things.  Seventy 
years  since,  that  country  was  able  to  insist  upon  and  to  establish 
its  claim  for  an  independent  government,  and,  by  aid  of  the  mea- 
sures then  adopted,  was  rapidly  advancing.  From  that  period  to 
the  close  of  the  century  the  demand  for  books  for  Ireland  was  so 
great  as  to  warrant  the  republication  of  a  large  portion  of  those 
produced  in  England.  The  kingdom  of  Ireland  of  that  day  gave 
to  the  world  such  men  as  Burke  and  Grattan,  Moore  and  Edge- 
worth,  Curran,  Sheridan,  and  Wellington.  Centralization,  how- 
ever, demanded  that  Ireland  should  become  a  province  of  Eng- 
land, and  from  that  time  famines  and  pestilences  have  been  of 
frequent  occurrence,  and  the  whole  population  is  now  being  ex- 
pelled to  make  room  for  the  "slow  and  unimpressible"  Saxon 
race.  Under  these  circumstances,  it  is  matter  of  small  surprise 
that  Ireland  not  only  produces  no  books,  but  that  she  furnishes  no 
market  for  those  produced  by  others.  Half  a  century  of  interna- 
tional copyright  has  almost  annihilated  both  the  producers  and 
the  consumers  of  books. 

Passing  towards  England  we  may  for  a  moment  look  to  Wales, 
and  then,  if  we  desire  to  find  the  effects  of  centralization  and  its 
consequent  absenteeism,  in  neglected  schools,  ignorant  teachers, 
decaying  and  decayed  churches,  and  drunken  clergymen  with 
immoral  flocks,  our  object  will  be  accomplished  by  studying  the 
pages  of  the  «  Edinburgh  Eeview  " 2  In  such  a  state  of  things  as 
is  there  described  there  can  be  little  tendency  to  the  development 

1  See  BlackwoocTs  Magazine,  Sept.  1853,  art.  "  Scotland  since  the  Union." 

2  April,  1853,  art.  "  The  Church  in  the  Mountains." 


46  INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT. 

of  intellect,  and  little  of  either  ability  or  inclination  to  reward  the 
authors  of  books.     In  my  next,  I  will  look  to  England  herself. 

LETTER    IV. 

ARRIVED  in  England,  we  find  there  everywhere  the  same  tend- 
ency towards  centralization.  Of  the  200,000  small  landed  propri- 
etors of  the  days  of  Adam  Smith  but  few  remain,  and  of  even  those 
the  number  is  gradually  diminishing.  Great  landed  estates  have 
everywhere  absentees  for  owners,  agents  for  managers,  and  day 
laborers  for  workmen.  The  small  landowner  was  a  resident,  and 
had  a  personal  interest  in  the  details  of  the  neighborhood,  not 
now  felt  by  either  the  owner  or  the  laborer.  This  state  of  things 
existed  to  a  considerable  extent  five-and-thirty  years  ago,  but  it 
has  since  grown  with  great  rapidity.  At  that  time  Great  Britain 
could  exhibit  to  the  world  perhaps  as  large  a  body  of  men  and 
women  of  letters,  with  world-wide  reputation,  as  ever  before 
existed  in  any  country  or  nation,  as  will  be  seen  from  the  follow- 
ing list :  — 

Byron,  Wilson,  Clarkson, 

Moore,  Hallam,  Landor, 

Scott,  Roscoe,  Wellington,1 

Wordsworth,  Malthus,  Robert  Hall, 

Rogers,  Ricardo,  Taylor, 

Campbell,  Mill,  Romilly, 

Joanna  'Baillie,  Chalmers,  Edgeworth, 

Southey,  Coleridge,  Hannah  More, 

Gifford,  Heber,  Dalton, 

Jeffrey,  Bentham,  Davy, 

Sydney  Smith,  Brown,  Wollaston, 

Brougham,  Mackintosh,  The  Herschels, 

Homer,  Stewart,  Dr.  Clarke. 

DeQuincey  was  then  just  coming  on  the  stage.  Crabbe,  Shel- 
ley, Keats,  Croly,  Hazlitt,  Lockhart,  Lamb,  Hunt,  Gait,  Lady 
Morgan,  Miss  Mitford,  Horace  Smith,  Hook,  Milman,  Miss  Aus- 
ten, and  a  host  of  others,  were  already  on  it.  Many  of  these  ap- 
pear to  have  received  rewards  far  greater  than  fall  now  to  the  lot 
of  some  of  the  most  distinguished  literary  men.  Crabbe  is  said 

1  Wellington's  dispatches  place  him  in  the  first  rank  of  historians. 


INTERNATIONAL   COPYRIGHT.  47 

to  have  received  3,000  guineas,  or  $15,000,  for  his  "  Tales  of 
the  Hall,"  and  Theodore  Hook  2,000  guineas  for  "  Sayings  and 
Doings,"  and,  if  the  facts  were  so,  they  prove  that  poets  and  novel- 
ists were  far  more  valued  then  than  now.  At  that  time,  Croker, 
Barrow,  and  numerous  other  men  of  literary  reputation  co-operated 
with  Soiithey  and  Giiford  in  providing  for  the  pages  of  the  "  Quar- 
terly." All  these,  men  and  women,  were  the  product  of  the  last 
century,  when  the  small  landholders  of  England  yet  counted 
by  hundreds  of  thousands. 

Since  then,  centralization  has  made  great  progress.  The  land- 
holders now  amount,  as  we  are  informed,  to  only  30,000,  and  the 
gulf  which  separates  the  great  proprietor  from  the  cultivator  has 
gradually  widened,  as  the  one  has  become  more  an  absentee  and 
the  other  more  a  day  laborer.  The  greater  the  tendency  to- 
wards the  absorption  of  land  by  the  wealthy  banker  and  mer- 
chant, or  the  wealthy  cotton-spinner  like  Sir  Robert  Peel,  the 
greater  is  the  tendency  towards  its  abandonment  by  the  small 
proprietor,  who  has  an  interest  in  local  self-government,  and  the 
greater  the  tendency  towards  the  centralization  of  power  in  Lon- 
don and  in  the  great  seats  of  manufacture.  In  all  those  places,  it 
is  thought  that  the  prosperity  of  England  is  dependent  upon  "  a 
cheap  and  abundant  supply  of  labor."  *  The  "  Times  "  assures  its 
readers  that  it  is  "  to  the  cheap  labor  of  Ireland  that  England  is 
indebted  for  all  her  great  works ; "  and  that  note  is  repeated  by  a 
large  portion  of  the  literary  men  of  England  who  now  ask  for  pro- 
tection in  the  American  market  against  the  effects  of  the  system 
they  so  generally  advocate. 

The  more  the  people  of  Scotland  can  be  driven  from  the  land 
to  take  refuge  in  Glasgow  and  Paisley,  the  cheaper  must  be  labor. 
The  more  those  of  Ireland  can  be  driven  to  England,  the  greater 
must  be  the  competition  in  the  latter  for  employment,  and  the 
lower  must  be  the  price  of  labor.  The  more  the  land  of  England 
can  be  centralized,  the  greater  must  be  the  mass  of  people  seeking 
employment  in  London,  Liverpool,  Manchester,  and  Birmingham, 
and  the  cheaper  must  labor  be. 

Low-priced  laborers  cannot  exercise  self-government.     All  they 

earn  is  required  for  supplying  themselves  with  indifferent  food, 

clothing,  and  lodging,  and  they  cannot  control  the  expenditure  of 

their  wages  to  such  extent  as  to  enable  them  to  educate  their 

1  North  British  Review,  November,  1852. 


48  INTERNATIONAL   COPYRIGHT. 

children,  and  hence  it  is  that  the  condition  of  the  people  of  Eng- 
land is  as  here  described :  — 

"  About  one  half  of  our  poor  can  neither  read  nor  write.  The  test  of  signing  the 
name  at  marriage  is  a  very  imperfect  absolute  test  of  education,  but  it  is  a  very  good 
relative  one:  taking  that  test,  how  stands  Leeds  itself  in  the  Registrar-General's 
returns?  In  Leeds,  which  is  the  centre  of  the  movement  for  letting  education 
remain  as  it  is,  left  entirely  to  chance  and  charity  to  supply  its  deficiencies,  how  do 
we  find  the  fact?  This,  that  in  1846,  the  last  year  to  which  these  returns  are 
brought  down,  of  1,850  marriages  celebrated  in  Leeds  and  Hunslet,  508  of  tfie  men 
and  1,020  of  the  women,  or  considerably  more  than  one  half  of  the  latter,  signed 
their  names  with  marks.  '  I  have  also  a  personal  knowledge  of  this  fact  —  that  of 
47  men  employed  upon  a  railway  in  this  immediate  neighborhood,  only  14  can  sign 
their  names  in  the  receipt  of  their  wages;  and  this  not  because  of  any  diffidence  on 
their  part,  but  positively  because  they  cannot  write.'  And  only  lately,  the  "  Leeds 
Mercury  "  itself  gave  a  most  striking  instance  of  ignorance  among  persons  from  Boeo- 
tian Pudsey :  of  12  witnesses, '  all  of  respectable  appearance,  examined  before  the 
Mayor  of  Bradford  at  the  court-house  there,  only  one  man  could  sign  his  name,  and 
that  indifferently.'  Mr.  Neison  has  clearly  shown,  in  statistics  of  crime  in  England 
and  Wales  from  1834  to  1844,  that  crime  is  invariably  the  most  prevalent  in  those 
districts  where  the  fewest  numbers  in  proportion  to  the  population  can  read  and 
write.  Is  it  not,  indeed,  beginning  at  the  wrong  end  to  try  and  reform  men  after 
they  have  become  criminals?  Yet  you  cannot  begin  with  children,  from  want  of 
schools.  Poverty  is  the  result  of  ignorance,  and  then  ignorance  is  again  the  unhappy 
result  of  poverty.  '  Ignorance  makes  men  improvident  and  thoughtless  —  women 
as  well  as  men ;  it  makes  them  blind  to  the  future  —  to  the  future  of  this  life  as  well 
as  the  life  beyond.  It  makes  them  dead  to  higher  pleasures  than  those  of  the  mere 
senses,  and  keeps  them  down  to  the  level  of  the  mere  animal.  Hence  the  enormous 
extent  of  drunkenness  throughout  this  country,  and  the  frightful  waste  of  means 
which  it  involves.'  At  Bilston,  amidst  20,000  people,  there  are  but  two  struggling 
schools  —  one  has  lately  ceased;  at  Millenhall,  Darlaston,  and  Pelsall,  amid  a  teem- 
ing population,  no  school  whatever.  In  Oldham,  among  100,000,  but  one  public 
day-school  for^the  laboring  classes ;  the  others  are  an  infant-school,  and  some  dame 
and  factory  schools.  At  Birmingham,  there  are  21,824  children  at  school,  and  23,176 
at  no  school;  at  Liverpool,  50,000  out  of  90,000  at  no  school;  at  Leicester,  8,200  out 
of  12,500;  and  at  Leeds  itself,  in  1841  (the  date  of  the  latest  returns),  some  9,600 
out  of  16,400  were  at  no  school  whatever.  It  is  the  same  in  the  counties.  '  I  have 
seen  it  stated  that  a  woman  for  some  time  had  to  officiate  as  clerk  in  a  church  in 
Norfolk,  there  being  no  adult  male  in  the  parish  able  to  read  and  write.'  For  a  pop- 
ulation of  17,000,000  we  have  but  twelve  normal  schools;  while  in  Massachusetts 
they  have  three  such  schools  for  only  800,000  of  population." 

Poverty  and  ignorance  produce  intemperance  and  crime,  and 
hence  it  is  that  both  so  much  abound  throughout  England.  In- 
fanticide, as  we  are  told,  prevails  to  an  extent  unknown  in  any 
other  part  of  the  world.  Looking  at  all  these  facts,  we  can 
readily  see  that  the  local  demand  for  information  throughout 
England  must  be  very  small,  and  this  enables  us  to  account  for 
the  extraordinary  fact,  that  in  all  that  country  there  has  been  no 
daily  newspaper  printed  out  of  London.  There  is,  consequently, 


INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT.  49 

no  local  demand  for  literary  talent.  The  weekly  papers  that  are 
published  require  little  of  the  pen,  but  much  of  the  scissors.  The 
necessary  consequence  of  this  is,  that  every  young  man  who  fan- 
cies he  can  write,  must  ^o  to  London  to  seek  a  channel  through 
which  he  may  be  enabled  to  come  before  the  public.  Here  we 
have  centralization  again.  Arrived  in  London,  he  finds  a  few 
daily  papers,  but  only  one,  as  we  are  told,  that  pays  its  expenses, 
and  around  each  of  them  is  a  corps  of  writers  and  editors  as  ill- 
disposed  to  permit  the  introduction  of  any  new  laborers  in  their 
field  as  are  the  street-beggars  of  London  to  permit  any  inter- 
ference with  their  "  beat."  If  he  desires  to  become  contributor  to 
the  magazines,  it  is  the  same.  To  obtain  the  privilege  of  con- 
tributing his  "  cheap  labor  "  to  their  pages,  he  must  be  well  intro- 
duced, and  if  he  make  the  attempt  without  such  introduction  he 
is  treated  with  a  degree  of  insolence  scarcely  to  be  imagined  by 
any  one  not  familiar  with  the  "answers  to  correspondents"  in 
London  periodicals.  If  disposed  to  print  a  book  he  finds  a  very 
limited  number  of  publishers,  each  one  surrounded  with  his  corps 
of  authors  and  editors,  and  generally  provided  with  a  journal  in 
which  to  have  his  own  books  well  placed  before  the  world.  If, 
now,  he  succeeds  in  gaining  favorable  notice,  he  finds  that  he  can 
obtain  but  a  very  small  proportion  of  the  price  of  his  book,  even 
if  it  sell,  because  centralization  requires  that  all  books  shall  be  ad- 
vertised in  certain  London  journals  that  charge  their  own  prices, 
and  thus  absorb  the  proceeds  of  no  inconsiderable  portion  of  the 
edition.  Next,  he  finds  the  Chancellor  of  the  Exchequer  re- 
quiring a  share  of  the  proceeds  of  the  book  for  permission  to  use 
paper,  and  further  permission  to  advertise  his  work  when  printed.1 
Inquiring  to  what  purpose  are  devoted  the  proceeds  of  all  these 
taxes,  he  learns  that  the  centralization  which  it  is  the  object 
of  the  British  cheap-labor  policy  to  establish,  requires  the  main- 
tenance of  large  armies  and  large  fleets  which  absorb  more  than 
all  the  profits  of  the  commerce  they  protect  The  bookseller  in- 
forms him  that  he  must  take  the  risk  of  finding  paper,  and  of 
paying  the  Chancellor  of  the  Exchequer,  and  the  "  Times  "  and 
numerous  other  journals  ;  that  every  editor  will  expect  a  copy ; 
that  the  interests  of  science  require  that  he,  poor  as  he  is,  shall 
give  no  less  than  eleven  copies  to  the  public ;  and  that  the  most 

1  The  tax  on  advertisements  has  just  now  been  repealed,  but  that  tax  was  a  small 
one  when  compared  with  that  imposed  by  centralization. 


50  INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT. 

that  can  be  hoped  for  from  the  first  edition  is,  that  it  will  not 
bring  him  in  debt.  His  book  appears,  but  the  price  is  high, 
for  the  reason  that  the  taxes  are  heavy,  and  the  general  de- 
mand for  books  is  small.  Cheap  laborers  cannot  buy  books ;  sol- 
diers and  sailors  cannot  buy  books ;  and  thus  xloes  centralization 
diminish  the  market  for  literary  talent  while  increasing  the  cost 
of  bringing  it  before  the  world.  Centralization  next  steps  in,  in  the 
shape  of  circulating  libraries,  that,  for  a  few  guineas  a  year,  supply 
books  throughout  the  kingdom,  and  enable  hundreds  of  copies  to 
do  the  work  that  should  be  done  by  thousands,  and  hence  it  is 
that,  while  first  editions  of  English  works  are  generally  small,  so 
very  few  of  them  ever  reach  second  ones.  Popular  as  was  Cap- 
tain Marryat,  his  first  editions  were,  as  he  himself  informed  me, 
for  some  time  only  1,500,  and  had  not  then  risen  above  2,000. 
Of  Mr.  Bulwer's  novels,  so  universally  popular,  the  first  edition 
never  exceeded  2,500  ;  and  so  it  has  been,  and  is,  with  others. 
With  all  Mr.  Thackeray's  popularity,  the  sale  of  his  books  has, 
I  believe,  rarely  gone  beyond  6,000  for  the  supply  of  above  thirty 
millions  of  people.  Occasionally,  a  single  author  is  enabled  to 
fix  the  attention  of  the  public,  and  he  is  enabled  to  make  a  for- 
tune —  not  from  the  sale  of  large  quantities  at  low  prices,  but  of 
moderate  quantities  at  high  prices.  The  chief  case  of  the  kind 
now  in  England  is  that  of  Mr.  Dickens,  who  sells  for  twenty 
shillings  a  book  that  costs  about  four  shillings  and  sixpence  to 
make,  and  charges  his  fellow-laborers  in  the  field  of  literature  an 
enormous  price  for  the  privilege  of  attaching  to  his  numbers  the 
advertisements  of  their  works,  as  is  shown  in  the  following  para- 
graph from  one  of  the  journals  of  the  day :  — 

"  Thus  far,  no  writer  has  succeeded  in  drawing  so  large  pecuniary  profits  from 
the  exercise  of  his  talents  as  Charles  Dickens.  His  last  romance,  "  Bleak  House," 
which  appeared  in  monthly  numbers,  had  so  wide  a  circulation  in  that  form  that  it 
became  a  valuable  medium  for  advertising,  so  that  before  its  close  the  few  pages  of 
the  tale  were  completely  lost  in  sheets  of  advertisements  which  were  stitched  to 
them.  The  lowest  price  for  such  an  advertisement  was  £1  sterling,  and  many  were 
paid  for  at  the  rate  of  £5  and  £6.  From  this  there  is  nothing  improbable  in  the 
supposition  that,  in  addition  to  the  large  sum  received  for  the  tale,  its  author  gained 
some  £15,000  by  his  advertising  sheets.  The  "  Household  Words  "  produces  an  in- 
come of  about  £4,000,  though  Dickens,  having  put  it  entirely  in  the  hands  of  an 
assistant  editor,  has  nothing  to  do  with  it  beyond  furnishing  a  weekly  article. 
Through  his  talents  alone  he  has  raised  himself  from  the  position  of  a  newspaper 
reporter  to  that  of  a  literary  Croesus." 

Centralization  produces  the  "  cheap  and   abundant  supply  of 


INTERNATIONAL   COPYRIGHT.  51 

labor  "  required  for  the  maintenance  of  the  British  manufacturing 
system,  and  "  cheap  labor  "  furnishes  Mr.  Dickens  with  his  "  Oliver 
Twist,"  his  "  Tom-all-alone's,"  and  the  various  other  characters 
and  situation  by  aid  of  whose  delineation  he  is  enabled,  as  a 
German  writer  informs  us,  to  have  dinners 

"  at  which  the  highest  aristocracy  is  glad  to  be  present,  and  where  he  equals  them 
in  wealth,  and  furnishes  an  intellectual  banquet  of  wit  and  wisdom  which  they, 
the  highest  and  most  refined  circles,  cannot  imitate." 

Centralization  enables  Mr.  Dickens  to  obtain  vast  sums  by  ad- 
vertising the  works  of  the  poor  authors  by  whom  he  is  surrounded, 
most  of  whom  are  not  only  badly  paid,  but  insolently  treated, 
while  even  of  those  whose  names  and  whose  works  are  well  known 
abroad  many  gladly  become  recipients  of  the  public  charity.  In 
the  zenith  of  her  reputation,  Lady  Charlotte  Bury  received,  as  I 
am  informed,  but  £200  ($960)  for  the  absolute  copyright  of 
works  that  sold  for  $7.50.  Lady  Blessington,  celebrated  as  she 
was,  had  but  from  three  to  four  hundred  pounds;  and  neither 
Marryat  nor  Bulwer  ever  received,  as  I  believe,  the  selling  price 
of  a  thousand  copies  of  their  books  as  compensation  for  the  copy- 
right.1 Such  being  the  facts  in  regard  to  well-known  authors, 
some  idea  may  be  formed  in  relation  to  the  compensation  of  those 
who  are  obscure.  The  whole  tendency  of  the  "  cheap  labor  "  sys- 
tem, so  generally  approved  by  English  writers,  is  to  destroy  the 
value  of  literary  labor  by  increasing  the  number  of  persons  who 
must  look  to  the  pen  for  means  of  support,  and  by  diminishing 
the  market  for  its  products.  What  has  been  the  effect  of  the  sys- 
tem will  now  be  shown  by  placing  before  you  a  list  of  the  names 
of  all  existing  British  authors  whose  reputation  can  be  regarded 
as  of  any  wide  extent,  as  follows :  — 

Tennyson,  Thackeray,  Grote,  McCulloch, 

Carlyle,  Bulwer,  Macaulay,  Hamilton, 

Dickens,  Alison,  J.  S.  Mill,          Faraday. 

This  list  is  very  small  as  compared  with  that  presented  in  the 
same  field  five-and-thirty  years  since,  and  its  difference  in  weight 
is  still  greater  than  in  number.  Scott,  the  novelist  and  poet,  may 
certainly  be  regarded  as  the  counterpoise  of  much  more  than  any 
one  of  the  writers  of  fiction  in  this  list.  Byron,  Moore,  Rogers, 
and  Campbell  enjoyed  a  degree  of  reputation  far  exceeding  that 
l  This  I  had  from  Captain  Marryat  himself. 


52  INTERNATIONAL   COPYRIGHT. 

of  Tennyson.  "Wellington,  the  historian  of  his  own  campaigns, 
would  much  outweigh  any  of  the  historians.  Malthus  and  Ri- 
cardo  were  founders  of  a  school  that  has  greatly  influenced  the 
policy  of  the  world,  whereas  McCulloch  and  Mill  are  but  dis- 
ciples in  that  school.  Dalton,  Davy,  and  Wollaston  will  probably 
occupy  a  larger  space  in  the  history  of  science  than  Sir  Michael 
Faraday,  large,  even,  as  may  be  that  assigned  to  him. 

Extraordinary  as  is  the  existence  of  such  a  state  of  things  in  a 
country  claiming  so  much  to  abound  in  wealth,  it  is  yet  more  ex- 
traordinary that  we  look  around  in  vain  to  see  who  are  to  replace 
even  these  when  age  or  death  shall  withdraw  them  from  the 

O 

literary  world.  Of  all  here  named,  Mr.  Thackeray  is  the  only  one 
that  has  risen  to  reputation  in  the  last  ten  years,  and  he  is  no 
longer  young ;  and  even  he  seeks  abroad  that  reward  for  his  ef- 
forts which  is  denied  to  him  by  the  "  cheap  labor  "  system  at  home. 
Of  the  others,  nearly,  if  not  quite  all,  have  been  for  thirty  years 
before  the  world,  and,  in  the  natural  course  of  things,  some  of 
them  must  disappear  from  the  stage  of  authorship,  if  not  of  life. 
If  we  seek  their  successors  among  the  writers  for  the  weekly  or 
monthly  journals,  we  shall  certainly  fail  to  find  them.  Looking 
to  the  Reviews,  we  find  ourselves  forced  to  agree  with  the  Eng- 
lish journalist,  who  informs  his  readers  that  "  it  is  said,  and  with 
apparent  justice,  that  the  quarterlies  are  not  as  good  as  they 
were."  From  year  to  year  they  have  less  the  appearance  of  being 
the  production  of  men  who  looked  to  any  thing  beyond  mere 
pecuniary  compensation  for  their  labor.  In  reading  them  we 
find  ourselves  compelled  to  agree  with  the  reviewer  who  regrets 
to  see  that  the  centralization  which  is  hastening  the  decline  of  the 
Scottish  universities  is  tending  to  cause  the  mind  of  the  whole 
youth  of  Scotland  to  be 

ll.  Cast  in  the  mould  of  English  universities,  institutions  which,  from  their  very 
completeness,  exercise  on  second-rate  minds  an  influence  unfavorable  to  originality 
and  power  of  thought."  —  North  British  Review,  May  1853. 

Their  pupils  are,  as  he  says,  struck  "  with  one  mental  die,"  than 
which  nothing  can  be  less  favorable  to  literary  or  scientific  devel- 
opment 

Thirty  years  since,  Sir  Humphrey  Davy  spoke  with  his  country- 
men as  follows :  — 

"  There  are  very  few  persons  who  pursue  science  with  true  dignity ;  it  is  followed 
more  as  connected  with  objects  of  profit  than  feme."  —  Consolation  in  Travel. 


INTERNATIONAL   COPYRIGHT.  53 

Since  then,  Sir  John  Herschel  has  said  to  them  : 

"  Here  whole  branches  of  continental  study  are  unstudied,  and  indeed  almost 
unknown  by  name.  It  is  in  vain  to  conceal  the  melancholy  truth.  We  are  fast 
dropping  behind."  —  Treatise  on  Sound. 

A  late  writer,  already  quoted,  says  that  learning  is  in  disrepute. 
The  English  people,  as  he  informs  us,  have 

"  No  longer  time  or  patience  for  the  luxury  of  a  learned  treatment  of  their  in- 
terests; and  a  learned  lawyer  or  statesmen,  instead  of  being  eagerly  sought  for,  is 
shunned  as  an  impediment  to  public  business."  — North  British  Review. 

The  reviewer  is,  as  he  informs  us,  "  far  from  regarding  this 
tendency,  unfavorable  as  it  is  to  present  progress,  as  a  sign  of 
social  retrogression."  He  thinks  that 

"  Reference  to  general  principles  for  rules  of  immediate  action  on  the  part  of  those 
actually  engaged  in  the  dispatch  of  business,  must,  from  the  delay  which  it  neces- 
sarily occasions,  come  to  be  regarded  as  a  worse  evil  than  action  which  is  at 
variance  with  principle  altogether." 

Demand  tends  to  procure  supply.  Destroy  the  demand,  and 
the  supply  will  cease.  Science,  whether  natural  or  social,  is  not 
in  demand  in  Great  Britain,  and  hence  the  diminution  of  supply. 
We  have  here  the  secret  of  literary  and  scientific  decline,  so 
obvious  to  all  who  study  English  books  or  journals,  or  read  the 
speeches  of  English  statesmen.  Empiricism  prevails  everywhere, 
and  there  is  a  universal  disposition  to  avoid  the  study  of  prin- 
ciples. The  "  cheap  labor  "  system,  which  it  is  the  object  of  the 
whole  British  policy  to  establish,  cannot  be  defended  o*n  principle, 
and  therefore  principles  are  avoided.  Centralization,  cheap  labor, 
and  enslavement  of  the  body  and  the  mind,  travel  always  in  com- 
pany, and  with  each  step  of  their  progress  there  is  an  increasing 
tendency  towards  the  accumulation  of  power  in  the  hands  of 
men  who  should  be  statesmen,  the  difficulties  of  whose  positions 
forbid,  however,  that  they  should  refer  to  scientific  principles  for 
their  government.  Action  must  be  had,  and  immediate  action  in 
opposition  to  principle  is  preferable  to  delay ;  and  hence  it  is  that 
real  statesmen  are  "  shunned  as  an  impediment  to  public  busi- 
ness." The  greater  the  necessity  for  statesmanship,  the  more 
must  statesmen  be  avoided.  The  nearer  the  ship  is  brought  to 
the  shoal,  the  more  carefully  must  her  captain  avoid  any  reference 
to  the  chart.  That  suchsis  the  practice  of  those  charged  with  the 
direction  of  the  affairs  of  England,  and  such  the  philosophy  of 
those  who  control  her  journals,  is  obvious  to  all  who  study  the 
proceedings  of  the  one  or  the  teachings  of  the  other.  From  year 


54  INTERNATIONAL   COPYRIGHT. 

to  year  the  ship  becomes  more  difficult  of  management,  and  there 
is  increasing  difficulty  in  finding  responsible  men  to  take  the 
helm.  Such  are  the  effects  upon  mind  that  have  resulted  from 
that  "  destruction  of  nationalities  "  required  for  the  perfection  of 
the  British  system  of  centralization. 

England  is  fast  becoming  one  great  shop,  and  traders  have,  in 
general,  neither  time  nor  disposition  to  cultivate  literature.  The 
little  proprietors  disappear,  and  ihe  day  laborers  who  succeed 
them  can  neither  educate  their  children  nor  purchase  books.  The 
great  proprietor  is  an  absentee,  and  he  has  little  time  for  either 
literature  or  science.  From  year  to  year  the  population  of  the 
kingdom  becomes  more  and  more  divided  into  two  great 
classes;  the  very  poor,  with  whom  food  and  raiment  require 
all  the  proceeds  of  labor,  and  the  very  rich  who  prosper  by  the 
cheap  labor  system,  and  therefore  eschew  the  study  of  principles. 
With  the  one  class,  books  are  an  unattainable  luxury,  while  with 
the  other  the  absence  of  leisure  prevents  the  growth  of  desire  for 
their  purchase.  The  sale  is,  therefore,  small ;  and  hence  it  is  that 
authors  are  badly  paid.  In  strong  contrast  with  the  limited  sale 
of  English  books  at  home,  is  the  great  extent  of  sale  here,  as 
shown  in  the  following  facts:  Of  the  octavo  edition  of  the 
"  Modern  British  Essayists,"  there  have  been  sold  in  five  years 
no  less  than  80,000  volumes.  Of  Macaulay's  "  Miscellanies,"  3 
vols.  12mo.,*the  sale  has  amounted  to  60,000  volumes.  Of  Miss 
Aguilar's  writings,  the  sale,  in  two  years,  has  been  100,000 
volumes.  Of  Murray's  "  Encyclopedia  of  Geography,"  more  than 
50,000  volumes  have  been  sold,  and  of  McCulloch's  "  Commercial 
Dictionary,"  10,000  volumes.  Of  Alexander  Smith's  poems,  the 
sale,  in  a  few  months,  has  reached  10,000  copies.  The  sale  of 
Mr.  Thackeray's  works  has  been  quadruple  that  of  England,  and 
that  of  the  works  of  Mr.  Dickens  counts  almost  by  millions  of 
volumes.  Of  "  Bleak  House,"  in  all  its  various  forms  —  in  news- 
papers, magazines,  and  volumes  —  it  has  already  amounted  to 
several  hundred  thousands  of  copies.  Of  Bulwer's  last  novel, 
since  it  was  completed,  the  sale  has,  I  am  told,  exceeded  35,000. 
Of  Thiers's  "  French  Revolution  and  Consulate,"  there  have  been 
sold  32,000,  and  of  Montagu's  edition  of  Lord  Bacon's  works 
4,000  copies. 

If  the  sales  of  books  were  as  great  in  England  as  they  are  here, 
English  authors  would  be  abundantly  paid.  In  reply  it  will  be 


INTERNATIONAL   COPYRIGHT.  55 

said  their  works  are  cheap  here  because  we  pay  no  copyright. 
For  payment  of  the  authors,  however,  a  very  small  sum  would 
be  required,  if  the  whole  people  of  England  could  afford,  as 
they  should  be  able  to  do,  to  purchase  books.  A  contribution 
of  a  shilling  per  head  would  give,  as  has  been  shown,  a  sum  of 
almost  eight  millions  of  dollars,  sufficient  to  pay  to  fifteen  hundred 
salaries  nearly  equal  to  those  of  our  Secretaries  of  State.  Cen- 
tralization, however,  destroys  the  market  for  books,  and  the  sale 
is,  therefore,  small ;  and  the  few  successful  writers  owe  their  for- 
tunes to  the  collection  of  large  contributions  made  among  a  small 
number  of  readers  ;  while  the  mass  of  authors  live  on,  as  did  poor 
Tom  Hood,  from  day  to  day,  with  scarcely  a  hope  of  improvement 
in  their  condition. 

Sixty  years  since,  Great  Britain  was  a  wealthy  country,  abound- 
ing in  libraries  and  universities,  and  giving  to  the  world  some  of 
the  best,  and  best  paid,  writers  of  the  age.  At  that  time  the 
people  of  this  country  were  but  four  millions,  and  they  were  poor, 
while  unprovided  with  either  books  or  libraries.  Since  then  they 
have  grown  to  twenty-six  millions,  millions  of  whom  have  been 
emigrants,  in  general  arriving  here  with  nothing  but  the  clothing 
on  their  backs.  These  poor  men  have  had  every  thing  to  create 
for  themselves  —  farms,  roads,  houses,  libraries,  schools,  and  col- 
leges ;  and  yet,  poor  as  they  have  been,  they  furnish  now  a 
demand  for  the  principal  products  of  English  mind'  greater  than 
is  found  at  home.  If  we  can  make  such  a  market,  why  cannot 
they  ?  If  they  had  such  a  market,  would  it  not  pay  their  authors 
to  the  full  extent  of  their  merits  ?  Unquestionably  it  would  ;  and 
if  they  see  fit  to  pursue  a  system  tending  to  cheapen  the  services 
of  the  laborer  in  the  field,  in  the  workshop,  and  at  the  desk,  there 
is  no  more  reason  for  calling  upon  the  people  of  this  country  to 
make  up  their  deficiencies  towards  those  who  contribute  to  their 
pleasure  or  instruction  by  writing  books,  than  there  would  be  in 
asking  us  to  aid  in  supporting  the  hundreds  of  thousands  of  day 
laborers,  their  wives  and  children,  whom  the  same  system  con- 
demns, unpitied,  to  the  workhouse. 

But,  it  will  be  asked,  is  it  right  that  we  should  read  the  works 
of  Macaulay,  Dickens,  and  others,  without  compensation  to  the 
authors  ?'  In  answer,  it  may  be  said,  that  we  give  them  precisely 
what  their  own  countrymen  have  given  to  their  Dalton,  Davy, 
"Wollaston,  Franklin,  Parry,  and  the  thousands  of  others  who 


56  INTERNATIONAL   COPYRIGHT. 

have  furnished  the  bodies  of  which  books  are  composed  —  and 
more  than  we  ourselves  give  to  the  men  among  us  engaged  in 
cultivating  science  —  fame.  This,  it  will  be  said,  is  an  unsub- 
stantial return  ;  yet  Byron  deemed  it  quite  sufficient  when  he  first 
saw  an  American  edition  of  his  works,  coming,  as  it  seemed  to 
him,  "  from  posterity."  Miss  Bremer  found  no  small  reward  for 
her  labors  in  knowing  the  high  regard  in  which  she  was  held ;  and 
it  was  no  small  payment  when,  even  in  the  wilds  of  the  West,  she 
met  with  numerous  persons  who'would  gladly  have  her  travel  free 
of  charge,  because  of  the  delight  she  had  afforded  them.  Miss 
Carlen  tells  her  readers  that  "  of  one  triumph  "  she  was  proud. 
"  It  was,"  she  says,  "  when  I  held  in  my  hand,  for  the  first  time, 
one  of  my  works,  translated  and  published  in  America.  My  eyes 
filled  with  tears.  The  bright  dreams  of  youth  again  passed  before 
me.  Ye  Americans  had  planted  the  seed,  and  ye  also  approved 
of  the  fruit !"  This  is  the  feeling  of  a  writer  that  cultivates  liter- 
ature with  some  object  in  view  other  than  mere  profit.  It  differs 
entirely  from  that  of  English  authors,  because  in  England,  more 
than  in  any  other  country,  book-making  is  a  trade,  carried  on 
exclusively  with  a  view  to  profit;  and  hence  it  is  that  the 
character  of  English  books  so  much  declines. 

But  is  it  really  true  that  foreign  authors  derive  no  pecuniary 
advantage  from  the  republication  of  their  books  in  this  country  ? 
It  is  not  Mr.  Macaulay  has  admitted  that  much  of  his  reputation, 
and  of  the  sale  of  his  books  at  home,  had  been  a  consequence  of 
his  reputation  here,  where  his  Essays  were  first  reprinted.  At  the 
moment  of  writing  this,  I  have  met  with  a  notice  of  his  speeches, 
first  collected  here,  from  which  the  following  is  an  extract :  — 

"  We  owe  much  to  America.  Not  content  with  charming  us  with  the  works  of 
her  native  genius,  she  teaches  us  also  to  appreciate  our  own.  She  steps  in  between 
the  timidity  of  a  British  author,  and  the  fastidiousness  of  the  British  public,  and  by 
using  her  '  good  offices'  brings  both  parties  to  a  friendly  understanding."  — Morn- 
ing Chronicle. 

If  the  people  of  England  are  largely  indebted  to  America  for 
being  made  acquainted  with  the  merits  of  their  authors,  are  not 
these  latter  also  indebted  to  America  for  much  of  their  pecuniary 
reward  ?  Undoubtedly  they  are.  Mr.  Macaulay  owes  much  of  his 
fortune  to  American  publishers,  readers,  and  critics ;  and  such  is 
the  case  to  perhaps  a  greater  extent  with  Mr.  Carlyle,  whose 
papers  were  first  collected  here,  and  their  merits  thus  made  known 


INTERNATIONAL   COPYRIGHT.  57 

to  his  countrymen.  Lamb's  papers  of  "  Elia  "  were  first  collected 
here.  It  is  to  the  diligence  of  an  American  publisher  that  De 
Quincey  owes  the  publication  of  a  complete  edition  of  his  works, 
now  to  be  followed  by  a  similar  one  in  England.  The  papers  of 
Professor  Wilson  owe  their  separate  republication  to  American 
booksellers.  The  value  of  Mr.  Thackeray's  copyrights  has  been 
greatly  increased  by  his  reception  here.  So  has  it  been  with  Mr. 
Dickens.  All  of  those  persons  profit  largely  by  their  fame  abroad, 
while  the  men  who  contribute  to  the  extension  of  knowledge  by 
the  publication  of  facts  and  ideas  never  reap  profit  from  their 
publication  abroad,  and  are  rarely  permitted  to  acquire  even  fame. 
Godfrey  died  poor.  The  merchants  of  England  gave  no  fortune 
to  his  children,  and  Hadley  stole  his  fame.  The  people  of  that 
country,  who  travel  in  steam-vessels,  have  given  to  the  family  of 
Fulton  no  pecuniary  reward,  while  her  writers  have  uniformly 
endeavored  to  deprive  him  of  the  reputation  which  constituted 
almost  the  sole  inheritance  of  his  family.  The  whole  people  of 
Europe  are  profiting  by  the  discovery  of  chloroform ;  but  who 
inquires  what  has  become  of  the  family  of  its  unfortunate  dis- 
coverer ?  Nobody  !  The  people  of  England  profit  largely  by  the 
discoveries  of  Fourcroy,  Berzelius,  and  many  other  of  the  conti- 
nental philosophers ;  but  do  those  who  manufacture  cheap  cloth, 
or  those  who  wear  it,  contribute  to  the  support  of  the  families  of 
those  philosophers?  Did  they  contribute  to  their  support  while 
alive  ?  Certainly  not.  To  do  so  would  have  been  in  opposition 
to  the  idea  that  the  real  contributors  to  knowledge  should  be 
"  hewers  of  wood  and  drawers  of  water "  for  the  gentlemen  who 
dress  up  their  facts  and  ideas  in  an  attractive  form  and  place  them 
before  the  world  in  the  form  of  cloth  or  books. 

We  are  largely  indebted  to  the  labors  of  literary  men,  and  they 
should  be  w.ell  paid,  but  their  claims  to  pecuniary  reward  have  been 
much  exaggerated,  because  they  have  held  the  pen  and  have  had 
always  a  high  degree  of  belief  in  their  own  deserts.  Their  right 
in  the  books  they  publish  is  precisely  similar  to,  and  no  greater 
than,  that  of  the  man  who  culls  the  flowers  and  arranges  the 
bouquets ;  and,  when  that  is  provided  for,  their  books  are  entitled 
to  become  common  property.  English  authors  are  already  secured 
in  a  monopoly  for  forty-two  years  among  a  body  of  people  so  large 
that  a  contribution  of  a  shilling  a  head  would  enable  each  and  all 
of  them  to  live  in  luxury ;  and  if  British  policy  prevents  their 


58  INTERNATIONAL   COPYRIGHT. 

countrymen  from  paying  them,  it  is  to  the  British  Parliament  they 
should  look  for  redress,  and  not  to  our  Executive.  When  they 
shall  awaken  to  the  fact  that  "  cheap  labor  "  with  the  spade,  the 
plough,  and  the  loom,  brings  with  it  necessarily  "  cheap  labor " 
with  the  pen,  they  will  become  opponents,  and  cease  to  be  advo- 
cates of  the  system  under  which  they  suffer.  All  that,  in  the 
mean  time,  we  can  say  to  them  is,  that  we  protect  our  own  authors 
by  giving  them  a  monopoly  of  our  own  immense  and  rapidly  grow- 
ing market,  and  that  if  they  choose  to  come  and  live  among  us  we 
will  grant  them  the  same  protection.  We  may  now  look  to  the 
condition  of  our  own  literary  men. 


LETTER  V. 

OUR  system  is  based  upon  an  idea  directly  the  reverse  of  the 
one  on  which  rests  the  English  system  —  that  of  decentralization ; 
and  we  may  now  study  its  effects  as  shown  in  the  development  of 
literary  tendencies  and  in  the  reward  of  authors. 

Centralization  tends  towards  taxing  the  people  for  building  up 
great  institutions  at  a  distance  from  those  who  pay  the  taxes ; 
decentralization  towards  leaving  to  the  people  to  tax  themselves  for 
the  support  of  common  and  high  schools  in  their  immediate  neigh- 
borhood. The  first  tends  towards  placing  the  man  who  has  instruc- 
tion to  sell  at  a  distance  from  those  who  need  to  buy  it ;  while  the 
other  tends  towards  bringing  the  teacher  to  the  immediate  vicinity 
of  the  scholars,  and  thus  diminishing  the  cost  of  education.  The 
effects  of  the  latter  are  seen  in  the  fact  that  the  new  States,  no  less 
than  the  old  ones,  are  engaged  in  an  effort  to  enable  all,  without 
distinction  of  sex  or  fortune,  to  obtain  the  instruction  needful  for 
enabling  them  to  become  consumers  of  books,  and  customers  to 
the  men  who  produce  them.  Massachusetts  exhibits  to  the  world 
182,000  scholars  in  her  public  schools ;  New  York,  778,000  in 
the  public  ones,  and  75,000  in  the  private  ones ;  and  Iowa  and 
Wisconsin  are  laying  the  foundation  of  a  system  that  will  enable 
them,  at  a  future  day,  to  do  as  much.  Boston  taxes  herself 
$365.000  for  purposes  of  education,  while  Philadelphia  expends 
mure  than  half  a  million  for  the  same  purposes,  and  exhibits 
50,000  children  in  her  public  schools.  Here  we  have,  at  once, 
a  great  demand  for  instructors,  offering  a  premium  on  intellect- 


INTERNATIONAL   COPYRIGHT.  59 

ual  effort,  and  its  effect  is  seen  in  the  numerous  associations  of 
teachers,  each  anxious  to  confer  with  the  others  in  regard  to 
improvement  in  the  modes  of  education.  School  libraries  are 
needed  for  the  children,  and  already  those  of  New  York  exhibit 
about  a  million  and  a  half  of  volumes.  Books  of  a  higher  class 

O 

are  required  for  the  teachers,  and  here  is  created  another  demand 
leading  to  the  preparation  of  new  and  improved  books  by  the 
teachers  themselves.  The  scholars  enter  life  and  next  we  find 
numerous  apprentices'  libraries  and  mercantile  libraries,  producing 
farther  demand  for  books,  and  aiding  in  providing  reward  for  those 
to  whom  the  world  is  indebted  for  them.  Everybody  must  learn 
to  read  and  write,  and  everybody  must  therefore  have  books ;  and 
to  this  universality  of  demand  it  is  due  that  the  sale  of  those 
required  for  early  education  is  so  immense.  Of  the  works  of 
Peter  Parley  it  counts  by  millions;  but  if,  we  take  his  three 
historical  books  (price  75  cents  each)  alone,  we  find  that  it 
amounts  to  between  half  a  million  and  a  million  of  volumes.  Of 
Goodrich's  United  States  it  has  been  a  quarter  of  a  million.  Of 
Morse's  Geography  and  Atlas  (50  cents)  the  sale  is  said  to  be  no 
less  than  70,000  per  annum.  Of  Abbott's  histories  the  sale  is 
said  to  have  already  been  more  than  400,000,  while  of  Emerson's 
Arithmetic  and  Reader  it  counts  almost  by  millions.  Of  Mitchell's 
several  geographies  it  is  400,000  a  year. 

In  other  branches  of  education  the  same  state  of  things  is  seen 
to  exist.  Of  the  Boston  Academy's  collection  of  sacred  music 
the  sale  has  exceeded  600,000 ;  and  the  aggregate  sale  of  five 
books  by  the  same  author  has  probably  exceeded  a  million,  at  a 
dollar  per  volume. 

Leaving  the  common  schools  we  come  to  the  high  schools  and 
colleges,  of  which  latter  the  names  of  no  less  than  120  are  given 
in  the  American  Almanac.  Here  again  we  have  decentralization, 
and  its  effect  is  to  bring  within  reach  of  almost  the  whole  people 
a  higher  degree  of  education  than  could  be  afforded  by  the  com- 
mon schools.  The  problem  to  be  solved  is,  as  stated  by  a  recent 
and  most  enlightened  traveller,  "How  are  citizens  to  be  made 
thinking  beings  in  the  greatest  numbers  ?  "  Its  solution  is  found 
in  making  of  the  educational  fabric  a  great  pyramid,  of  which  the 
common  schools  form  the  base  and  the  Smithsonian  Institute  th'e 
apex,  the  intermediate  places  being  filled  with  high  schools,  lyce- 
urns,  and  colleges  of  various  descriptions,  fitted  to  the  powers  and 


60  INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT. 

the  means  of  those  who  need  instruction.  All  these  make,  of  course, 
demand  for  books,  and  hence  it  is  that  the  sale  of  Anthon's  series 
of  classics  (averaging  $1)  amounts,  as  I  am  told,  to  certainly  not 
less  than  50,000  volumes  per  annum,  while  of  the  "  Classical  Dic- 
tionary "  of  the  same  author  ($4)  not  less  than  thirty  thousand  have 
been  sold.  Of  Liddell  and  Scott's  "  Greek  Lexicon  "  ($5),  edited 
by  Prof.  Drisler,  the  sale  has  been  not  less  than  25,000,  and  probably 
much  larger.  Of  Webster's  4to.  "  Dictionary"  ($6)  it  has  been,  I 
am  assured,  60,000,  and  perhaps  even  80,000  ;  and  of  the  royal  8vo. 
one  ($3.50),  250,000.  Of  Bolmar's  French  school  books  not  less 
than  150,00  volumes  have  been  sold.  The  number  of  books  used 
in  the  higher  schools  —  text-books  in  philosophy,  chemistry,  and 
other  branches  of  science  —  is  exceedingly  great,  and  it  would  be 
easy  to  produce  numbers  of  which  the  sale  is  from  five  to  ten 
thousand  per  annum  ;  but  to  do  so  would  occupy  too  much  space, 
and  I  must  content  myself  with  the  few  facts  already  given  in 
regard  to  this  department  of  literature. 

Decentralization,  or  local  self-government,  tends  thus  to  place 
the  whole  people  in  a  condition  to  read  newspapers,  while  the' 
same  cause  tends  to  produce  those  local  interests  which  give 
interest  to  the  public  journals,  and  induce  men  to  purchase  them. 
Hence  it  is  that  their  number  is  so  large.  The  census  of  1850 
gives  it  at  2,625  ;  and  the  increase  since  that  time  has  been  very 
great.  The  total  number  of  papers  printed  can  scarcely  be  under 
600,000,000,  which  would  give  almost  24  for  every  person,  old  and 
young,  black  and  white,  male  and  female,  in  the  Union.  But 
recently  the  newspaper  press  of  the  United  Kingdom  was  said 
to  require  about  160,000  reams  of  paper,  which  would  give  about 
75,000,000  of  papers,  or  two  and  a  half  per  head. 

The  number  of  daily  papers  was  returned  at  350,  but  it  has 
greatly  increased,  and  must  now  exceed  four  hundred.  Chicago, 
which  then  was  a  small  town,  rejoices  now  in  no  less  than  24 
periodicals,  seven  of  which  are  daily,  and  five  of  them  of  the 
largest  size.  At  St.  Louis,  which  but  a  few  years  since  was  on 
the  extreme  borders  of  civilization,  we  find  several,  and  one  of 
these  has  grown  from  a  little  sheet  of  8  by  12  inches  to  the  largest 
size,  yielding  to  its  proprietors  $50,000  per  annum,  while  Liver- 
pool, Manchester,  and  Birmingham  are  still  compelled  to  depend 
upon  their  tri- weekly  sheets.  St.  Louis  itself  furnishes  the  type, 
and  Louisville  furnishes  the  paper.  Everywhere,  the  increase  in 


INTERNATIONAL   COPYRIGHT.  01 

size  is  greater  than  that  in  the  number  of  newspapers,  and  the 
increase  of  ability  in  both  the  city  and  country  press,  greater  than 
in  either  number  or  size.  These  things  are  necessary  conse- 
quences of  that  decentralization  which  builds  school-houses  and 
provides  teachers,  where  centralization  raises  armies  and  provides 
generals.  The  schools  enable  young  men  to  read,  think,  and 
write,  and  the  local  newspaper  is  always  at  hand  in  which  to  pub- 
lish. Beginning  thus  with  the  daily  or  weekly  journal,  the  youth 
of  talent  makes  his  way  gradually  to  the  monthly  or  quarterly 
magazine,  and  ultimately  to  the  independent  book. 

Examine  where  we  may  through  the  newspaper  press,  there  is 
seen  the  activity  which  always  accompanies  the  knowledge  that 
men  can  rise  in  the  world  if  they  will ;  but  this  is  particularly 
obvious  in  the  daily  press  of  cities,  whose  efforts  to  obtain  infor- 
mation, and"  whose  exertions  to  lay  it  before  the  public,  are  with- 
out a  parallel.  Centralization,  like  that  of  the  London  "  Times," 
furnishes  its  readers  with  brief  paragraphs  of  telegraphic  news, 
where  decentralization  gives  columns.  The  New  York  "  Tribune  " 
furnishes,  for  two  cents,  better  papers  than  are  given  in  London 
for  ten,  and  it  scatters  them  over  the  country  by  hundreds  of 
thousands.  Decentralization  is  educating  the  whole  mind  of  the 
country,  and  it  is  to  this  it  is  due  that  the  American  farmer  is  fur- 
nished with  machines  which  are,  according  to  the  London  "  Times," 
"about  twice  as  light  in  draught  as  the  lightest  of  English 
machines  of  the  same  description,  doing  as  much,  if  not  more 
work  than  the  best  of  them,  and  with  much  less  power ;  dressing 
the  grain,  which  they  do  not,  and  which  can  be  profitably  disposed 
of  at  one  half,  or  at  least  one  third  less  money  than  its  British 
rivals  "  —  and  is  thus  enabled  to  purchase  books.  Centralization, 
on  the  other  hdnd,  furnishes  the  English  farmer,  according  to  the 
same  authority,  "  with  machines  strong  and  dear  enough  to  rob 
him  of  all  future  improvements,  and  tremendously  heavy,  either  to 
work  or  to  draw ; "  and  thus  deprives  him  of  all  power  to  educate 
his  children,  or  to  purchase  for  himself  either  books  or  news- 
papers. 

Religious  decentralization  exerts  also  a  powerful  influence  on 
the  arrangements  for  imparting  that  instruction  which  provides 
purchasers  for  books.  The  Methodist  Society,  with  its  gigantic 
operations ;  the  Presbyterian  Board  of  Publication ;  the  Baptist 
Association  ;  the  Sunday-school,  and  other  societies,  are  all  inces- 


62  INTERNATIONAL   COPYRIGHT. 

santly  at  work  creating  readers.  The  effect  of  all  these  efforts  for 
the  dissemination  of  cheap  knowledge  is  shown  in  the  first 
instance  in  the  number  of  semi-monthly,  monthly,  and  quarterly 
journals,  representing  every  shade  of  politics  and  religion,  and 
every  department  of  literature  and  science. 

The  number  of  these  returned  to  the  census  was  175  ;  but  that 
must,  I  think,  have  been  even  then  much  below  the  truth.  Since 
then  it  has  been  much  increased.  Of  two  of  them,  Putnam's  and 
Harper's,  the  first  exclusively  original,  and  the  latter  about  two 
thirds  so,  the  sale  is  about  two  millions  of  numbers  per  annum ; 
while  of  three  others,  published  in  Philadelphia,  it  is  about  a 
million.  Cheap  as  are  these  journals',  at  twenty-five  cents  each, 
the  sum  total  of  the  price  paid  for  them  by  the  consumers  is 
about  $700,000.  The  quantity  of  paper  required  for  a  single  one 
of  them  is  about  16,000  reams  of  double  medium,*  being  one 
tenth  as  much  as  has  recently  been  given  as  the  consumption  of 
the  whole  newspaper  press  of  Great  Britain  and  Ireland.  Every 
pursuit  in  life,  and  almost  every  shade  of  opinion,  has  its  periodi- 
cal. A  single  city  in  Western  New  York  furnishes  no  less  than 
four  agricultural  and  horticultural  journals,  one  of  them  published 
weekly,  with  a  circulation  of  15,000,  and  the  others,  monthly,  with 
a  joint  circulation  of  25,000.  The  "  Merchants'  Magazine,"  which 
set  the  example  for  the  one  now  published  in  London,  has  a  circu- 
lation of  3,500.  The  "  Bankers'  Magazine  "  also  set  the  example 
recently  followed  in  England.  Medicine  and  Law  have  their 
numerous  and  well  supported  journals ;  and  Dental  Surgery  alone 
has  five,  one  of  which  has  a  circulation  of  5,000  copies,  while  all 
Europe  has  but  two,  and  those  of  very  inferior  character.1  North, 
south,  east,  and  west,  the  periodical  press  is  collecting  the  opinions 
of  all  our  people,  while  centralization  is  gradually  limiting  the 
expression  of  opinion,  in  England,  to  those  who  live  in  and  near 
London. 

Upon  this  extensive  base  of  cheap  domestic  literature  rests 
that  portion  of  the  fabric  composed  of  reproduction  of  foreign 
books,  the  quantities  of  some  of  which  were  given  in  my  last. 
The  proportion  which  .these  bear  to  American  books  has  been 
thus  given  for  the  six  months  ending  on  the  30th  of  June  last :  — 

1  It  is  a  remarkable  fact  that  there  should  be  in  this  country  no  less  than  four  Col- 
leges of  Dental  Surgery,  while  all  Europe  presents  not  even  a  single  one. 


INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT. 


63 


Republi  cations 
Original 


169 
522 

691 


Of  these  last,  17  were  original  translations. 

We  see,  thus,  that  the  proportion  of  domestic  to  foreign  pro- 
ducts is  already  more  than  three  to  one.  How  the  sale  of  the 
latter  compares  with  that  of  the  former,  will  be  seen  by  the  follow- 
ing facts  in  relation  to  books  of  almost  all  sizes,  prices,  and  kinds  ; 
some  of  which  have  been  furnished  by  the  publishers  themselves, 
whilst  others  are  derived  from  gentlemen  connected  with  the 
trade  whose  means  of  information  are  such  as  warrant  entire 
reliance  upon  their  statements. 

Of  all  American  authors,  those  of  school-books  excepted,  there 
is  no  one  of  whose  books  so  many  have  been  circulated  as  those 
of  Mr.  Irving.  Prior  to  the  publication  of  the  edition  recently 
issued  by  Mr.  Putnam,  the  sale  had  amounted  to  some  hundreds 
of  thousands ;  and  yet  of  that  edition,  selling  at  $1.25  per  volume, 
it  has  already  amounted  to  144,000  vols.  Of  "  Uncle  Tom,"  the  sale 
has  amounted  to  295,000  copies,  partly  in  one,  and  partly  in  two 
volumes,  and  the  total  number  of  volumes  amounts  probably  to 

about  450,000. 

Price  per  vol.      Volvmet. 

Of  the  two  works  of  Miss  "Warner,  Queechy, 
and  the  "Wide,  Wide  World,  the  price  and 

sale  have  been  .        .        .        .        .        .  $  88  104,QOO 

Fern  Leaves,  by  Fanny  Fern,  in  six  months  .  1  25  45,000 

Reveries  of  a  Bachelor,  and  other  books,  by  ' 

Ike  Marvel        ......  1  25  70,000 

Alderbrook,  by  Fanny  Forester,  3  vols.         .  50  33,000 

Northup's  Twelve  Years  a  Slave  ...        .  1  00  20,000 

Novels  of  Mrs.  Hentz,  in  three  years    .        .  63  93,000 

Major  Jones'  Courtship  and  Travels      .        .  50  31,000 

Salad  for  the  Solitary,  by  a  new  author,  in 

five  months 1  25  5,000 

Headley's  Napoleon  and  his  Marshals,  Wash- 
ington and  his  Generals,  and  other  works  .  1  25  200,000 

Stephen's  Travels  in  Egypt  and  Greece        .  87  80,000 

M            "       Yucatan  and  Central  America  2  50  60,000 

Kendall's  Expedition  to  Santa  Fe  .      .        .  1  25  40,000 


64 


INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT. 


Price  per  vol. 

.  $3  00 


Vdlumet. 
15,000 
8,000 
14,000 
12,000 
30,000 
60,000 
100,000 
280,000 


Lynch's  Expedition  to  the  Dead  Sea,  8vo. 

"  «  "       12mo.     .         1  25 

Western  Scenes    ......         2  50 

Young's  Science  of  Government  .         .        .         1  00 

Seward's  Life  of  John  Quincy  Adams  .         .         1  00 

Frost's  Pictorial  History  of  the  World,  3  vols.         2  50 

Sparks'  American  Biography,  25  vols.   .         .  75 

Encyclopaedia  Americana,  14  vols.        .        .        2  00 

Griswold's  Poets  and  Prose  Writers  of  Amer- 
ica, 8  vols 3  00        21,000 

Barnes'  Notes  on  the  Gospels,  Epistles,  &c., 
11  vols. 

Aiken's  Christian  Minstrel,  in  two  years 

Alexander  on  the  Psalms,  3  vols.  . 

Buist's  Flower  Garden  Directory  . 

Cole  on  Fruit  Trees 

"       Diseases  of  Domestic  Animals. 

Downing's  Fruits  and  Fruit  Trees 

"          Rural  Essays        .... 

"          Landscape  Gardening  . 

"          Cottage  Residences 

"          Country  Homes   .... 

Mahan's  Civil  Engineering    .... 

Leslie's  Cookery  and  Receipt-books 

Guyot's  Lectures  on  Earth  and  Man 

Wood  and  Bache's  Medical  Dispensatory 

Dunglison's  Medical  Writings,  in  all  10  vols. 

Pancoast's  Surgery,  4to.         ».-.*• 

Rayer,  Ricord,  and  Moreau's  Surgical  Works 

(translations) 15  00  5,500 

Webster's  Works,  6  vols 2  00         46,800 

Kent's  Commentaries,  4  vols.         .         .        .         3  38         84,000 
Next  to  Chancellor  Kent's  work  comes  Greenleaf  on  Evidence, 

3  vols.,  $16.50;  the  sale  of  which  has  been  exceedingly  great, 

but  what  has  been  its  extent,  I  cannot  say. 

Of  Blatchford's  General  Statutes  of  New  York,  a  local  work, 

price  $4.50,  the  sale  has  been  3,000  ;  equal  to  almost  30,000  of  a 

similar  work  for  the  United  Kingdom. 

How  great  is  the  sale  of  Judge  Story's  books  can  be  judged 


75 

300,000 

62 

40,000 

1  17 

10,000 

1  25 

10,000 

50 

18,000 

50 

34,000 

1  50 

15,000 

3  50 

3,000 

3  50 

9,000 

2  00 

6,250 

4  00 

3,500 

3  00 

7,500 

1  00 

96,000 

1  00 

6,000 

5  00 

60,000 

2  50 

50,000 

10  00 

4,000 

INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT.  65 

only  from  the  fact  that  the  copyright  now  yields,  and  for  years  past 
has  yielded,  more  than  $8,000  per  annum.  Of  the  sale  of  Mr. 
Prescott's  works  little  is  certainly  known,  but  it  cannot,  I  under- 
stand, have  been  less  than  160,000  volumes.  That  of  Mr.  Ban- 
croft's History,  has  already  risen,  certainly  to  30,000  copies,  and  I 
am  told  it  is  considerably  more  ;  and  yet  even  that  is  a  sale,  for 
such  a  work,  entirely  unprecedented. 

Of  the  works  of  Hawthorne,  Longfellow,  Bryant,  Willis,  Curtis, 
Sedgwick,  Sigourney,  and  numerous  others,  the  sale  is  exceedingly 
great ;  but,  as  not  even  an  approximation  to  the  true  amount  can 
be  offered,  I  must  leave  it  to  you  to  judge  of  it  by  comparison 
with  those  of  less  popular  authors  above  enumerated.  In  several 
of  these  cases,  beautifully  illustrated  editions  have  been  published, 
of  which  large  numbers  have  been  sold.  Of  Mr.  Longfellow's 
volume  there  have  been  no  less  than  ten  editions.  These  various 
facts  will  probably  suffice  to  satisfy  you  that  this  country  presents 
a  market  for  books  of  almost  every  description,  unparalleled  in  the 
world. 

In  reflecting  upon  this  subject,  it  is  necessary  to  bear  in  mind 
that  the  monopoly,  granted  to  authors  and  their  families,  is  for  the 
term  of  no  less  than  forty-two  years,  and  that  in  that  period  the 
number  of  persons  subjected  to  it  is  likely  to  grow  to  little  short  of 
a  hundred  millions,  with  a  power  of  consumption  that  will  probably 
be  ten  times  greater  than  now  exists.  If  the  Commentaries  of  Chan- 
cellor Kent  continue  to  maintain  their  present  position,  as  they 
probably  will,  may  we  not  reasonably  suppose  that  the  demand  for 
them  will  continue  as  great,  or  nearly  so,  as  it  is  at  present,  and 
that  the  total  sale  during  the  period  of  copyright  will  reach  a 
quarter  of  a  million  of  volumes  ?  So,  too,  of  the  histories  of 
Bancroft  and  Prescott,  and  of  other  books  of  permanent  character. 

Such  being  the  extent  of  the  market  for  the  products  of  literary 
labor,  we  may  now  inquire  into  its  rewards. 

Beginning  with  the  common  schools,  we  find  a  vast  number  of 
young  men  and  young  women  acting  as  teachers  of  others,  while 
qualifying  themselves  for  occupying  other  places  in  life.  Many  of 
them  rise  gradually  to  become  teachers  in  high  schools  and  pro- 
fessors in  colleges,  while  all  of  them  have  at  hand  the  newspaper, 
ready  to  enable  them,  if  gifted  with  the  power  of  expressing  them- 
selves on  paper,  to  come  before  the  world.  The  numerous  news- 
papers require  editors  and  contributors,  and  the  amount  appro- 


66  INTERNATIONAL   COPYRIGHT. 

priated  to  the  payment  of  this  class  of  the  community  is  a  very 
large  one.  Next  come  the  magazines,  many  of  which  pay  very 
liberally.  I  have  now  before  me  a  statement  from  a  single  pub- 
lisher, in  which  he  says  that  to  Messrs.  Willis,  Longfellow,  Bryant, 
and  Alston,  his  price  was  uniformly  $50  for  a  poetical  article,  long  or 
short  —  and  his  readers  know  that  they  were  generally  very  short ; 
in  one  case  only  fourteen  lines.  To  numerous  others  it  was  from  $25 
to  $40.  In  one  case  he  has  paid  $25  per  page  for  prose.  To  Mr. 
Cooper  he  paid  $1V800  for  a  novel,  and  $1,000  for  a  series  of  naval 
biographies,  the  author  retaining  the  copyright  for  separate  pub- 
lication ;  and  in  such  cases,  if  the  work  be  good,  its  appearance  in 
the  magazine  acts  as  the  best  of  advertisements.  To  Mr.  James 
he  paid  $1,200  for  a  novel,  leaving  him  also  the  copyright.  For 
a  single  number  of  the  journal  he  has  paid  to  authors  $1,500.  The 
total  amount  paid  for  original  matter  by  two  magazines  —  the 
selling  price  of  which  is  $3  per  annum  — -  in  ten  years,  has  ex- 
ceeded $180,000,  giving  an  average  of  $18,000  per  annum.  The 
Messrs.  Harper  inform  me  that  the  expenditure  for  literary  and 
artistic  labor  required  for  their  magazine  is  $2,000  per  month,  or 
$24,000  a  year. 

Passing  upwards,  we  reach  the  producers  of  books,  and  here 
we  find  rewards  not,  I  believe,  to  be  paralleled  elsewhere.  Mr. 
Irving  stands,  I  imagine,  at  the  head  of  living  authors  for  the 
amount  received  for  his  books.  The  sums  paid  to  the  renowned 
Peter  Parley  must  have  been  enormously  great,  but  what  has  been 
their  extent  I  have  no  means  of  ascertaining.  Mr.  Mitchell,  the 
geographer,  has  realized  a  handsome  fortune  from  his  school- 
books.  Professor  Davies  is  understood  to  have  received  more 
than  $50,000  from  the  series  published  by  him.  The  Abbotts, 
Emerson,  and  numerous  other  authors  engaged  in  the  preparation 
of  books  for  young  persons  and  schools,  are  largely  paid.  Profes- 
sor Anthon,  we  are  informed,  has  received  more  than  $60,000  for 
his  series  of  classics.  The  French  series  of  Mr.  Bolmar  has  yielded 
him  upwards  of  $20,000.  The  school  geography  of  Mr.  Morse  is 
stated  to  have  yielded  more  than  $20,000  to  the  author.  A  single 
medical  book,  of  one  8vo.  volume,  is  understood  to  have  produced  its 
authors  $60,000,  and  a  series  of  medical  books  has  given  to  its  au- 
thor probably  $30,000.  Mr.  Downing's  receipts  from  his  books 
have  been  very  large.  The  two  works  of  Miss  Warner  must  have 
already  yielded  her  from  $12,000  to  $15,000,  and  perhaps  much 


INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT.  67 

more.  Mr.  Headley  is  stated  to  have  received  about  $40,000 ; 
and  the  few  books  of  Ike  Marvel  have  yielded  him  about  $20,000 ; 
a  single  one,  "  The  Reveries  of  a  Bachelor,"  produced  more  than 
$4,000  in  the  first  six  months.  Mrs.  Stowe  has  been  very  largely 
paid.  Miss  Leslie's  Cookery  and  Receipt  books  have  paid  her 
$12,000.  Dr.  Barnes  is  stated  to  have  received  more  than 
$30,000  for  the  copyright  of  his  religious  works.  Fanny  Fern 
has  probably  received  not  less  than  $6,000  for  the  12mo.  volume 
published  but  six  months  since.  Mr.  Prescott  was  stated,  several 
years  since,  to  have  then  received  $90,000  from  his  books,  and  I 
have  never  seen  it  contradicted.  According  to  the  rate  of  com- 
pensation generally  understood  to  be  received  by  Mr.  Bancroft,  the 
present  sale  of  each  volume  of  his  yields  him  more  than  $15,000, 
and  he  has  the  long  period  of  forty-two  years  for  future  sale. 
Judge  Story  died,  as  has  been  stated,  in  the  receipt  of  more  than 
$8,000  per  annum  ;  and  the  amount  has  not,  as  it  is  understood, 
diminished.  Mr.  Webster's  works,  in  three  years,  can  scarcely 
have  paid  less  than  $25,000.  Kent's  Commentaries  are  under- 
stood to  have  yielded  to  their  author  and  his  heirs  more  than 
$120,000,  and  if  we  add  to  this  for  the  remainder  of  the  period 
only  one  half  of  this  sum,  we  shall  obtain  $180,000,  or  $45,000  as 
the  compensation  for  a  single  8vo.  volume,  a  reward  for  literary 
labor  unexampled  in  history.  What  has  been  the  amount  received 
by  Professor  Greenleaf  I  cannot  learn,  but  his  work  stands  second 
only,  in  the  legal  line,  to  that  of  Chancellor  Kent.  The  price 
paid  for  Webster's  8vo.  Dictionary  is  understood  to  be  fifty 
cents  per  copy  ;  and  if  so,  with  a  sale  of  250,000,  it  must  already 
have  reached  $125,000.  If  now  to  this  we  add  the  quarto,  at  only 
a  dollar  a  copy,  we  shall  have  a  sum  approaching  to,  and  perhaps 
exceeding,  $180,000  ;  more,  probably,  than  has  been  paid  for  all 
the  dictionaries  of  Europe  in  the  same  period  of  time.  What 
have  been  the  prices  paid  to  Messrs.  Hawthorne,  Longfellow, 
Bryant,  Willis,  Curtis,  and  numerous  others,  I  cannot  say;  but 
it  is  well  known  that  they  have  been  very  large.  It  is  not,  how- 
ever, only  the  few  who  are  liberally  paid ;  all  are  so  who  manifest 
any  ability,  and  here  it  is  that  we  find  the  effect  of  the  decentraliz- 
ing system  of  this  country  as  compared  with  the  centralizing  one 
of  Great  Britain.  There  Mr.  Macaulay  is  largely  paid  for  his 
Essays,  while  men  of  almost  equal  ability  can  scarcely  obtain  the 
means  of  support.  Dickens  is  a  literary  Croesus,  and  Tom  Hood 


68  INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT. 

dies  leaving  his  family  in  hopeless  poverty.  Such  is  not  here  the 
case.  Any  manifestation  of  ability  is  sure  to  produce  claimants  for 
the  publication  of  books.  No  sooner  had  the  story  of  "  Hot 
Corn  "  appeared  in  "  The  Tribune,"  than  a  dozen  booksellers  were 
applicants  to  the  author  for  a  book.  The  competition  is  here  for 
the  purchase  of  the  privilege  of  printing,  and  this  competition  is 
not  confined  to  the  publishers  of  a  single  city,  as  is  the  case  in 
Britain.  Boston,  New  York,  Philadelphia,  and  even  Auburn  and 
Cincinnati,  present  numerous  publishers,  all  anxious  to  secure  the 
works  of  writers  of  ability,  in  any  department  of  literature ;  and 
were  it  possible  to  present  a  complete  list  of  our  well-paid  authors, 
its  extent  could  not  fail  to  surprise  you  greatly,  as  the  very  few 
facts  that  have  come  to  my  knowledge  in  reference  to  some  of  the 
lesser  stars  of  the  literary  world  have  done  by  me.  You  will 
observe  that  I  have  confined  myself  to  the  question  of  demand  for 
books  and  compensation  to  their  authors,  without  reference  to  that 
of  the  ability  displayed  in  their  preparation.  That  we  may  have 
good  books,  all  that  is  required  is  that  we  make  a  large  market  for 
them,  which  is  done  here  to  an  extent  elsewhere  unknown. 

Forty  years  since,  the  question  was  asked  by  the  "  Edinburgh 
Review,"  Who  reads  an  American  book  ?  Judging  from  the  facts 
here  given,  may  we  not  reasonably  suppose  that  the  time  is  fast 
approaching,  when  the  question  will  be  asked,  Who  does  not  read 
American  books  ? 

Forty  years  since,  had  we  asked  where  were  the  homes  of  Amer- 
ican authors,  we  should  generally  have  been  referred  to  very  hum- 
ble houses  in  our  cities.  Those  who  now  inquire  for  them  will 
find  their  answer  in  the  beautiful  volume  lately  published  by 
Messrs.  Putnam  and  Co.,  the  precursor  of  others  destined  to  show 
the  literary  men  of  this  country  enjoying  residences  as  agreeable 
as  any  that  had  been  occupied  by  such  men  in  any  part  of  the 
world ;  and  in  almost  every  case,  those  homes  have  been  due  to 
the  profits  of  the  pen.  Less  than  half  a  century  since,  the  race 
of  literary  men  was  scarcely  known  in  the  country,  and  yet  the 
amount  now  paid  for  literary  labor  is  greater  than  in  Great  Britain 
and  France  combined,  and  will  probably  be,  in  twenty  years  more, 
greater  than  in  all  the  world  beside.  With  the  increase  of  num- 
ber, there  has  been  a  corresponding  increase  in  the  consideration 
in  which  they  are  held ;  and  the  respect  with  which  even  unknown 
authors  are  treated,  when  compared  with  the  disrespect  manifested 


INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT.  69 

in  England  towards  such  men,  will  be  obvious  to  all  familiajr  with 
the  management  of  the  journals  of  that  country  who  read  the 
following  in  one  of  our  principal  periodicals :  — 

"  The  editor  of  Putnam's  Monthly  will  give  to  every  article  forwarded  for  in- 
sertion in  the  Magazine  a  careful  examination,  and,  when  requested  to  do  so,  will 
return  the  MS.  if  not  accepted." 

Here,  the  competition  is  among  the  publishers  to  buy  the  pro- 
ducts of  literary  labor,  whereas,  abroad,  the  competition  is  to  sett 
them,  and  therefore  is  the  treatment  of  our  authors,  even  when 
unknown,  so  different.  Long  may  it  continue  to  be  so ! 

Such  having  been  the  result  of  half  a  century,  during  which  we 
have  had  to  lay  the  foundation  of  the  system  that  has  furnished  so 
vast  a  body  of  readers,  what  may  not  be  expected  in  the  next  half 
century,  during  which  the  population  will  increase  to  a  hundred 
millions,  with  a  power  to  consume  «the  products  of  literary  labor 
growing  many  times  faster  than  the  growth  of  numbers  ?  If  this 
country  is  properly  termed  "  the  paradise  of  women,"  may  it  not  be 
as  correctly  denominated  the  paradise  of  authors,  and  should  they 
not  be  content  to  dwell  in  it  as  their  predecessors  have  done  ?  Is 
it  wise  in  them  to  seek  a  change  ?  Their  best  friends  would,  I 
think,  unite  with  me  in  advising  that  it  is  not.  Should  they  suc- 
ceed in  obtaining  what  they  now  desire,  the  day  will,  as  I  think, 
come,  when  they  will  be  satisfied  that  their  real  friends  had  been 
those  who  opposed  the  confirmation  of  the  treaty  now  before  the 
Senate. 

LETTER    VI. 

WE  have  commenced  the  erection  of  a  great  literary  and  scien- 
tific edifice.  The  foundation  is  already  broad,  deep,  and  well  laid, 
but  it  is  seen  to  increase  in  breadth,  depth,  and  strength,  with  every 
step  of  increase  in  height ;  and  the  work  itself  is  seen  to  assume, 
from  year  to  year,  more  and  more  the  natural  form  of  a  true  pyra- 
mid. To  -the  height  that  such  a  building  may  be  carried,  no  living 
man  will  venture  to  affix  a  limit.  What  is  the  tendency  to  dura- 
bility in  a  work  thus  constructed,  the  pyramids  of  Egypt  and  the 
mountains  of  the  Andes  and  of  the  Himalaya  may  attest.  That 
edifice  is  the  product  of  decentralization. 

Elsewhere,  centralization  is,  as  has  been  shown,  producing  the 
opposite  effect,  narrowing  the  base,  and  diminishing  the  elevation. 


70  INTERNATIONAL   COPYRIGHT. 

Having  prospered  under  decentralization,  our  authors  seek  to  in- 
troduce centralization.  Failing  to  accomplish  their  object  by  the 
ordinary  course  of  legislation,  they  have  had  recourse  to  the  execu- 
tive power ;  and  thus  the  end  to  be  accomplished,  and  the  means 
used  for  its  accomplishment,  are  in  strict  accordance  "with  each 
other. 

We  are  invited  to  grant  to  the  authors  and  booksellers  of  Eng- 
land, and  their  agent  or  agents  here,  entire  control  over  a  highly 
important  source  from  which  our  people  have  been  accustomed  to 
derive  their  supplies  of  literary  food.  Before  granting  to  these 
persons  any  power  here,  it  might  be  well  to  inquire  how  they  have 
used  their  power  at  home.  Doing  this,  we  find  that,  as  is  usually 
the  case  with  those  enjoying  a  monopoly,  they  have  almost  uni- 
formly preferred  to  derive  their  profits  from  high  prices  and  small 
sales,  and  have  thus,  in  a  great  degree,  deprived  their  countrymen 
of  the  power  to  purchase  books;  a  consequence  of  which  has  been 
that  the  reading  community  has,  very  generally,  been  driven  to 
dependence  upon  circulating  libraries,  to  the  injury  of  both  the 
authors  and  the  public.  The  extent  to  which  this  system  of  high 
prices  in  regard  to  school-books  has  been  carried,  and  the  danger 
of  intrusting  such  men  with  power,  are  well  shown  in  the  fact  that 
the  same  government  which  has  so  recently  concluded  a  copyright 
treaty  with  our  own,  has  since  entered  "  into  the  bookselling  trade 
on  its  own  account,"  competing  "  with  the  private  dealer,  who  has 
to  bear  copyright  charges."  The  subjects  of  this  "  reactionary 
step  "  on  the  part  of  a  government  that  so  much  professes  to  love 
free  trade,  are,  as  we  are  told,  "  the  famous  school-books  of  the 
Irish  national  system."  *  A  new  office  has  been  created,  "  paid  for 
with  a  public  salary,"  for  "  the  issue  of  books  to  the  retail  deal- 
ers ; "  and  the  centralization  of  power  over  this  important  portion  to 
the  trade  is,  we  are  told,2  defended  in  the  columns  of  the  "  Times," 
as  "  tending  to  bring  down  the  price  of  school-books ;  for  book- 
sellers who  possess  copyrights,  now  sell  their  books  at  exorbitant 
prices,  and,  by  underselling  them,  the  commissioners  w<ll  be  able 
to  beat  them."  Judging  from  this,  it  would  seem  almost  necessary, 
if  this  treaty  is  to  be  ratified,  that  there  should  be  added  some 
provision  authorizing  our  government  to  appoint  commissioners  for 
the  regulation  of  trade,  and  for  "  underselling  "  those  persons  who 
"  now  sell  their  books  at  exorbitant  prices."  If  it  be  ratified,  we 
l  Spectator,  June  4, 1853.  2  lUd. 


INTERNATIONAL   COPYRIGHT.  71 

shall  be  only  entering  on  the  path  of  centralization ;  and  it  may 
not  be  amiss  that,  before  ratification,  we  should  endeavor  to  deter- 
mine to  what  point  it  will  probably  carry  us  in  the  end. 

The  question  is  often  asked,  What  difference  can  it  make  to  the 
people  of  this  country  whether  they  do,  or  do  not,  pay  to  the  Eng- 
lish author  a  few  cents  in  return  for  the  pleasure  afforded  by  the 
perusal  of  his  book  ?  Not  very  much,  certainly,  to  the  wealthy 
reader  ;  but  as  every  extra  cent  is  important  to  the  poorer  one,  and 
tends  to  limit  his  power  to  purchase,  it  may  be  well  to  calculate 
how  many  cents  would  probably  be  required ;  and,  that  we  may  do 
so,  I  give  you  here  a  list *  of  the  comparative  prices  of  English  and 
American  editions  of  a  few  of  the  books  that  have  been  published 
within  the  last  few  years :  — 

English.          Amer. 

Brande's  Encyclopaedia  .....          $15  00  $4  00 

lire's  Dictionary  of  Manufactures          .  .  •  .        15  00  5  00 

Alison's  Europe,  cheapest  edition      .  .  .  •  25  00  5  00 

D'Aubign<5's  Reformation  .  .  .  .  .        11  50  2  25 

Bulwer's  "  My  Novel " 10  50  76 

Lord  Mahon's"  England  ...  13  00  4  00 

Macaulay's  England,  per  vol.  ....  4  50  40 

Campbell's  Chief  Justices  .  .  .  •  7  50  3  50 

"  Lord  Chancellors  .  .  •  •  25  50  12  00 

Queens  of  England,  8  vols 2400  1000 

Queens  of  Scotland 1500  600 

Hallam's  Middle  Ages 7  50  1  75 

Arnold's  Rome     .        .  ....  12  00  3  00 

Life  of  John  Foster  .  .  .  .  .  .600 

Layard's  Nineveh,  complete  edition  .  .  •  • 

Mrs.  Somerville's  Physical  Sciences       .  .  •  .         2  50 

Whewell's  Elements  of  Morality       .... 

Napier's  Peninsular  War  .  .  •  .        12  00 

Thirlwall's  Greece,  cheapest  edition 

Dick's  Practical  Astronomer       ...  .         2  50 

Jane  Eyre 7  60  25 

The  difference,  as  we  see,  between  the  selling  price  in  London 
and  in  New  York,  of  the  first  book  in  this  list,  is  no  less  than  eleven 
dollars,  or  almost  three  times  as  much  as  the  whole  price  of  the 
American  edition.  To  what  is  this  extraordinary  difference  to  be 
attributed  ?  To  any  excess  in  the  cost  of  paper  or  printing  in 
London  ?  Certainly  not ;  for  paper  and  printers'  labor  are  both 
cheaper  there  than  here.  Is  it,  then,  to  the  necessity  for  compen- 
sating the  author  ?  Certainly  not ;  for  there  are  in  this  country 
fifty  persons  as  fully  competent  as  Mr.  Brande  for  the  preparation 
i  Copied  from  an  article  in  the  New  York  Daily  Times. 


72  INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT. 

of  such  a  work,  who  would  willingly  do  it  for  a  dollar  a  copy,  cal- 
culating upon  being  paid  out  of  a  large  sale.  As  the  sale  of  books 
in  England  is  not  large,  it  might  be  necessary  to  allow  him  two 
dollars  each ;  but  even  this  would  still  leave  nine  dollars  to  be 
accounted  for.  Where  does  all  this  go  ?  Part  of  it  to  the  Chan- 
cellor of  the  Exchequer,  part  to  the  "  Times,"  and  other  newspapers 
and  journals  that  charge  monopoly  prices  for  the  privilege  of  adver- 
tising, and  the  balance  to  the  booksellers  who  "  possess  copyrights," 
and  "  sell  their  books  at  such  exorbitant  prices "  that  they  have 
driven  the  government  to  turn  bookseller,  with  a  view  to  bring  down 
prices ;  and  these  are  the  very  men  to  whom  it  is  now  proposed  to 
grant  unlimited  control  over  the  sale  of  all  books  produced  abroad. 

It  will,  perhaps,  be  said  that  the  treaty  contains  a  proviso  that 
the  author  shall  sell  his  copyright  to  an  American  publisher,  or 
shall  himself  cause  his  book  to  be  republished  here.  Such  a  pro- 
viso may  be  there,  but  whether  it  is  so,  or  not,  no  one  knows,  for 
every  thing  connected  with  this  effort  to  extend  the  Executive 
power  is  kept  as  profoundly  secret  as  were  the  arrangements  for 
the  Napoleonic  coup  <E&tat  of  the  2d  of  December.  Secrecy  and 
prompt  and  decisive  action  are  the  characteristics  of  centralized 
governments  —  publicity  and  slow  action  those  of  decentralized 
ones.  Admit,  however,  that  such  limitations  be  found  in  the 
treaty,  by  what  right  are  they  there  ?  The  basis  of  such  a  treaty 
is  the  absolute  right  of  the  author  to  his  book ;  and  if  that  be  ad- 
mitted, with  what  show  of  consistency  or  of  justice  can  we  under- 
take to  dictate  to  him  whether  he  shall  sell  or  retain  it  —  print  it 
here  or  abroad  ?  With  none,  as  I  think. 

Admit,  however,  that  he  does  print  it,  does  the  treaty  require 
that  the  market  shall  always  be  supplied  ?  Perhaps  it  does,  but 
most  probably  it  does  not.  If  it  does,  does  it  also  provide  for  the 
appointment  of  commissioners  to  see  that  the  provision  is  always 
complied  with  ?  If  it  does  not,  nothing  would  seem  to  be  easier 
than  to  send  out  the  plates  of  a  large  book,  print  off  a  small 
edition,  and  by  thus  complying  with  the  letter  of  the  law,  establish- 
ing the  copyright  for  the  long  term  of  forty-two  years,  the  moment 
after  which  the  plates  could  be  returned  to  the  place  whence  they 
came,  and  from  that  place  the  consumers  could  be  supplied  on 
condition  of  paying  largely  to  the  Chancellor  of  the  Exchequer,  to 
the  "  Times,"  to  the  profits  of  Mr.  Dickens'  advertising  sheet,  to 
the  author,  to  the  London  bookseller,  to  his  agent  in  America,  anri 


INTERNATIONAL  COPY-RIGHT.  73 

the  retail  dealer  here.  In  cases  like  this,  and  they  would  be  nu- 
merous, the  "  few  cents  "  would  probably  rise  to  be  many  dollars ; 
and  no  way  can,  I  think,  be  devised  to  prevent  their  occurrence, 
except  to  take  one  more  step  forward  in  centralization  by  the  ap- 
pointment of  commissioners  in  various  parts  of  the  Union,  to  see 
that  the  market  is  properly  supplied,  and  that  the  books  offered 
for  sale  have  been  actually  printed  on  this  side  of  the  Atlantic. 

If  the  treaty  does  provide  for  publication  here,  it  probably  al- 
lows some  time  therefor,  say  one,  two,  or  three  months.  It  is,  how- 
ever, well-known  that  of  very  many  books  the  first  few  weeks' 
sales  constitute  so  important  a  part  of  the  whole  that  were  the 
publisher  here  deprived  of  them,  the  book  would  never  be  repub- 
lished.  No  one  could  venture  to  print  until  the  time  had  elapsed, 
and  by  that  time  the  English  publisher  would  so  well  have  occu- 
pied the  ground  with  the  foreign  edition  that  publication  here 
would  be  effectually  stopped.  Even  under  the  present  ad  valorem 
system  of  duties  this  is  being  done  to  a  great  extent  One,  two, 
or  three  hundred  copies  of  large  works  are  cheaply  furnished,  and 
the  market  is  thus  just  so  far  occupied  as  to  forbid  the  printing  of 
an  edition  of  one  or  more  thousands  —  to  the  material  injury  of 
paper-makers,  printers,  and  book-binders,  and  without  any  corres- 
ponding benefit  to  the  foreign  author.  Under  the  proposed  sys- 
tem this  would  be  done  to  a  great  extent. 

Admit,  however,  that  the  spirit  of  the  law  be  fully  complied 
with,  and  let  us  see  its  effects.  Mr.  Dickens  sells  his  book  in 
England  for  21s.  ($5.00) ;  and  he  will,  of  course,  desire  to  have 
for  it  here  as  large  a  price  as  it  will  bear.  Looking  at  our  prices 
for  those  books  which  are  copyright  and  of  which  the  sale  is 
large,  he  finds  that  "  Bleak  House  "  contains  four  times  as  much  as 
the  "  Reveries  of  a  Bachelor,"  which  sells  for  $1.25,  and  he  will  be 
most  naturally  led  to  suppose  that  $3  is  a  reasonable  price..  The 
number  of  copies  of  his  book  that  has  been  supplied  to  American 
readers,  through  newspapers  and  magazines,  is  certainly  not  less 
than  250,000,  and  the  average  cost  has  not  been  more  than  fifty 
cents,  giving  for  the  whole  the  sum  of  .  .  .  $125,000 

To  supply  the  same  number  at  his  price  would  cost .        750,000 


Difference •      $625,000 

Of  Mr.  Bulwer's  last  work,  the  number  that  has 
been  supplied  to  American  consumers  is  probably  but 


74 


INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT. 


about  two  thirds  as  great,  and  the  difference  might  not 
amount  to  more  than  ...... 

Mr.  Macaulay  would  not  be  willing  to  sell  his  book 
more  cheaply  than  that  of  Mr.  Bancroft's  is  sold,  or 
$2  per  volume,  and  he  might  ask  $2.50.  Taking  it 
at  the  former  price,  the  125,000  copies  that  have  been 
sold  would  cost  the  consumer  .  .  .  $500,000 

They  have  been  supplied  for   .         .        .     100,000 


The  difference  would  be  . 

Mr.  Alison's  work  would  make  twelve  such  volumes 
as  those  of  Mr.  Bancroft,  and  his  price  would  not  be 
less  than  $25.  The  sale  has  amounted,  as  I  under- 
stand, to  25,000  copies,  which  would  give  as  the  cost 
of  the  whole .  $625,000 

The  price  at  which  they  have  been  sold 
is  $5,  giving       .,      .....     125,000 

Difference       » 

Of  "  Jane  Eyre  "  there  have  been  sold  80,000,  and  if 
the  price  had  been  similar  to  that  of  "  Fanny  Fern," 
they  would  have  cost  the  consumers  .  $100,000 

They  have  cost  about      ....       25,000 

Difference 


$350,000 


$400,000 


$500,000 


$75,000 


Total  result  of  a  "  few  cents  "  on  five  books  .  .  $1,950,000 
Under  the  system  of  international  copyright,  one  of  two  things 
must  be  done  —  either .  the  people  must  be  taxed  in  the  whole  of 
this  amount  for  the  benefit  of  the  various  persons,  abroad  and  at 
home,  who  are  now  to  be  invested  with  the  monopoly  power,  or 
they  must  largely  diminish  their  purchases  of  literary  food. 

The  quantity  of  books  above  given  cannot  be  regarded  as  more 
than  one  twentieth  of  the  total  quantity  of  new  ones  annually 
printed.  Admit,  however,  that  the  total  were  but  ten  times 
greater,  and  that  the  differences  were  but  one  fourth  as  great,  it 
would  be  required  that  this  sum  of  $1,950,000  should  be  multiplied 
two  and  a  half  times,  and  that  would  give  about  five  millions  of 
dollars ;  which,  added  to  the  sum  already  obtained,  would  make 
seven  millions  per  annum ;  and  yet  we  have  arrived  only  at  the 


INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT.  75 

commencement  of  the  operation.  All  these  books  would  require 
to  be  reprinted  in  the  next  year,  and  the  next,  and  so  on,  and  for 
the  long  period  of  forty-two  years  the  payment  on  old  books  would 
require  to  be  added  to  those  on  new  ones,  until  the  sum  would  be- 
come a  very  startling  one.  To  enable  us  to  ascertain  what  it 
must  become,  let  us  see  what  it  would  now  be  had  this  system 
existed  in  the  past.  Every  one  of  Scott's  novels  would  still  be 
copyright,  and  such  would  be  the  case  with  Byron's  poems,  and 
with  all  other  books  that  have  been  printed  in  the  last  forty-two 
years,  of  which  the  annual  sale  now  amounts  to  many  millions  of 
volumes.  To  the  present  price  of  these  let  us  add  the  charge  of 
the  author,  and  the  monopoly  charges  of  the  English  and  Ameri- 
can publishers,  and  it  will  be  found  quite  easy  to  obtain  a  further 
sum  of  five  millions,  which,  added  to  that  already  obtained,  would 
make  twelve  millions  per  annum,  or  enough  to  give  to  one  in  every 
four  thousand  males  in  the  United  Kingdom,  between  the  ages  of 
twenty  and  sixty,  a  salary  far  exceeding  that  of  our  Secretaries  of 
State.  Let  this  treaty  be  confirmed,  and  let  the  consumption 
of  foreign  works  continue  at  its  present  rate,  and  payment  of  this 
sum  must  be  made.  We  can  escape  its  payment  only  on  condition 
of  foregoing  consumption  of  the  books. 

The  real  cause  of  difficulty  is  not  to  be  found  in  "the  few 
cents  "  required  for  the  author,  but  in  the  means  required  to  be 
adopted  for  their  collection.  Everybody  that  reads  "  Bleak  House," 
or  "  Oliver  Twist,"  would  gladly  pay  their  author  some  cents,  however 
unwilling  he  might  be  to  pay  dollars,  or  pounds.  So,  too,  every- 
body who  uses  chloroform  would  willingly  pay  something  to  its 
discoverer ;  and  every  one  who  believes  in  and  profits  by  homoBO- 
pathic  medicines  would  be  pleased  to  contribute  "  a  few  cents  " 
for  the  benefit  of  Hahnemann,  his  widow,  or  his  children.  A  sin- 
gle cent  paid  by  all  who  travel  on  steam  vessels  would  make  the 
family  of  Fulton  one  of  the  richest  in  the  world  ;  but  how  collect 
these  "  few  cents  "  ?  Grant  me  a  monopoly,  says  the  author,  and  I 
will  appoint  an  agent,  who  shall  supply  other  agents  with  my  books, 
and  I  will  settle  with  him.  Grant  us  a  monopoly,  say  the  represen- 
tatives of  Hahnemann,  and  we  will  grant  licenses,  throughout  the 
Union,  to  numerous  men  who  shall  be  authorized  to  practice 
homoeopathically  and  collect  our  taxes.  Were  this  experiment 
tried,  it  would  be  found  that  millions  would  be  collected,  out  of 
which  they  would  receive  tens  of  thousands.  Grant  us  a  mo- 


76  INTERNATIONAL   COPYRIGHT. 

nopoly,  might  say  the  representatives  of  Fulton,  and  we  will  per- 
mit no  vessels  to  be  built  without  license  from  us,  and  our  agents 
will  collect  "  a  few  cents  "  from  each  passenger,  by  which  we  shall 
be  enriched.  So  they  might  be  ;  but  for  every  cent  that  reached 
them  the  community  would  be  taxed  dollars  in  loss  of  time  and 
comfort,  and  in  extra  charges.  It  is  the  monopoly  privilege,  and 
not  the  "  few  cents,"  that  makes  the  difficulty. 

We  are,  however,  advised  by  the  advocates  of  this  treaty  that 
English  authors  must  be  "  required "  to  present  their  books  in 
American  "  mode  and  dress,"  and  that  regard  to  their  own  inter- 
ests will  cause  them  to  be  presented  "  at  MODERATE  PRICES  for 
general  consumption."  If,  however,  they  have  acted  differently  at 
home,  why  should  they  pursue  this  course  here  ?  That  they  have 
so  acted,  we  have  proof  in  the  fact  that  the  British  government 
has  just  been  forced  to  turn  bookseller,  with  a  view  to  restrain  the 
owners  of  copyrights  in  the  exercise  of  power.  Who,  again,  is 
to  determine  what  prices  are  really  "  moderate "  ones  ?  The 
authors?  Will  Mr.  Macaulay  consent  that  his  books  shall  be 
sold  for  less  than  those  of  Mr.  Bancroft  or  Mr.  Prescott  ?  As- 
suredly not.  The  bookseller,  then  ?  Will  he  not  use  his  power 
in  reference  to  foreign  books  precisely  as  he  does  now  in  regard  to 
domestic  ones?  If  he  deems  it  now  expedient  to  sell  a  12mo 
volume  for  a  dollar  or  a  dollar  and  a  quarter,  is  it  probable  that 
the  ratification  of  this  treaty  will  open  his  eyes  to  the  fact  that  it 
would  be  better  for  him  to  sell  Mr.  Dickens's  works  at  fifty  cents 
than  at  three  dollars  ?  Scarcely  so,  as  I  think.  It  is  now  about 
thirty  years  since  the  "  Sketch  Book  "  was  printed,  and  the  cheapest 
edition  that  has  yet  been  published  sells  for  one  dollar  and  twenty- 
five  cents.  "  Jane  Eyre  "  contains  probably  about  the  same  quantity 
of  matter,  and  sells  for  twenty-five  cents.  Of  the  latter,  about 
80,000  have  been  printed,  costing  the  consumers  $20,000 ;  but  if 
they  were  to  purchase  the  same  quantity  of  the  former,  they  would 
pay  for  them  $100,000  ;  difference,  $80,000.  What,  now,  would 
become  of  this  large  sum?  But  little  of  it  would  reach  the 
author;  not  more,  probably,  than  $10,000.  Of  the  remaining 
$70,000,  some  would  go  to  printers,  paper-makers,  and  book- 
binders, and  the  balance  would  be  distributed  among  the  pub- 
lisher, the  trade-sale  auctioneers,  and  the  wholesale  and  retail 
dealers ;  the  result  being  that  the  public  would  pay  five  dollars 
where  the  author  received  one,  or  perhaps  the  half  of  one.  We 


INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT.  77 

have  here  the  real  cause  of  difficulty.  The  monopoly  of  copy- 
right can  be  preserved  only  by  connecting  it  with  the  monopoly  of 
publication.  "Were  it  possible  to  say  that  whoever  chose  to  pub- 
lish the  "  Sketch  Book  "  might  do  so,  on  paying  to  its  author  "  a  few 
cents,"  the  difficulty  of  this  double  monopoly  would  be  removed  ; 
but  no  author  would  consent  to  this,  for  he  could  have  no  certainty 
that  his  book  might  not  be  printed  by  unprincipled  men,  who 
would  issue  ten  thousand  while  accounting  to  him  for  only  a  single 
thousand.  To  enable  him  to  collect  his  dues,  he  must  have  a 
monopoly  of  publication. 

It  may  be  said  that  if  he  appropriate  to  his  use  any  of  the  com- 
mon property  of  which  books  are  made  up,  and  so  misuse  his 
privilege  as  to  impose  upon  his  readers  the  payment  of  too  heavy 
a  tax,  other  persons  may  use  the  same  facts  and  ideas,  and  enter 
into  competition  with  him.  In  no  other  case,  however,  than  in 
those  of  the  owners  of  patents  and  copyrights,  where  the  public 
recognizes  the  existence  of  exclusive  claim  to  any  portion  of  the 
common  property,  does  it  permit  the  party  to  fix  the  price  at  which 
it  may  be  sold.  The  right  of  eminent  domain  is  common  prop- 
erty. In  virtue  of  it,  the  community  takes  possession  of  private 
property  for  public  purposes,  and  frequently  for  the  making  of 
roads.  Not  unfrequently  it  delegates  to  private  companies  this 
power,  but  it  always  fixes  the  rate  of  charge  to  be  made  to  per- 
sons who  use  the  road.  This  is  done  even  when  general  laws  are 
passed  authorizing  all  who  please,  on  compliance  with  certain 
forms,  to  make  roads  to  suit  themselves.  In  such  cases,  limitation 
would  seem  to  be  unnecessary,  as  new  roads  could  be  made  if  the 
tolls  on  old  ones  were  too  high ;  and  yet  it  is  so  well  understood 
that  the  making  of  roads  does  carry  with  it  monopoly  power,  that 
the  rates  of  charge  are  always  limited,  and  so  limited  as  not  to 
permit  the  road-makers  to  obtain  a  profit  disproportioned  to  the 
amount  of  their  investments.  In  the  case  of  authors  there  can  be 
no  such  limitation.  They  must  have  monopoly  powers,  and  the 
law  therefore  very  wisely  limits  the  time  within  which  they  may 
be  exercised,  as  in  the  other  case  it  limits  the  price  that  may  be 
charged.  In  France,  the  prices  to  be  paid  to  dramatic  authors 
are  fixed  by  law,  and  all  who  pay  may  play  ;  and  if  this  could  be 
done  in  regard  to  all  literary  productions,  permitting  all  who  paid 
to  print,  much  of  the  difficulty  relative  to  copyright  would  be 
removed ;  but  this  course  of  operation  would  be  in  direct  oppo- 


78  INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT. 

sition  to  the  views  of  publishers  who  advocate  this  treaty  on  the 
ground  that  it  would  add  to  "  the  security  and  respectability  of 
the  trade."  They  would  prefer  to  pay  for  the  copyright  of  every 
foreign  book,  because  it  would  bring  with  it  monopoly  prices  and 
monopoly  profits,  both  of  which  would  need  to  be  paid  by  the 
consumers  of  books.  To  the  paper-maker,  printer,  and  book- 
binder, called  upon  to  supply  one  thousand  of  a  book  for  the  few, 
where  before  they  had  supplied  ten  thousand  for  the  many,  it 
would  be  small  consolation  to  know  that  they  were  thereby  build- 
ing up  the  fortunes  of  two  or  three  large  publishing  houses  that 
had  obtained  a  monopoly  of  the  business  of  republication,  and 
were  thus  adding  to  the  "  security  and  respectability  of  the  trade." 
As  little  would  probably  be  derived  from  this  source  by  the  father 
of  a  family  who  found  that  he  had  now  to  pay  five  dollars  for  what 
before  had  cost  but  one,  and  must  therefore  endeavor  to  borrow, 
where  before  he  had  been  accustomed  to  buy,  the  books  required 
for  the  amusement  and  instruction  of  his  children. 

Our  State  of  New  Jersey  levies  a  transit  duty  of  eight  cents  per 
ton  on -all  the  merchandise  that  crosses  it.  Had  the  imposition  of 
this  tax  been  accompanied  by  a  law  permitting  all  who  chose  to 
make  roads,  no  one  would  have  complained  of  it,  as  it  would  have 
been  little  more  than  a  fair  tax  on  the  property  of  the  railroad 
and  other  companies.  Unfortunately,  however,  the  course  was 
different.  To  the  company  that  collected  it  was  granted  a  mo- 
nopoly of  the  power  of  transportation,  and  that  power  has  been  so 
used  that  while  the  State  received  but  eight  cents  the  transporters 
charged  three,  five,  six,  and  eight  dollars  for  work  that  should 
have  been  done  for  one.  The  position  in  which  the  authors  are 
necessarily  placed  is  precisely  the  one  in  which  our  State  ,has 
voluntarily  placed  itself.  To  enable  them  to  collect  their  dues, 
some  person  or  persons  must  have  a  monopoly  of  publication,  and 
they  must  and  will  collect  five,  ten,  and  often  twenty  dollars  for 
every  one  that  reaches  the  author.  The  Union  would  gain  largely 
by  paying  into  our  treasury  thrice  the  sum  we  receive  for  transit 
duty,  on  the  simple  condition  that  we  abolished  the  monopoly  of 
transportation ;  and  it  would  gain  far  more  largely  by  doing  the 
same  with  foreign  authors.  If  justice  does  really  call  upon  us  to 
pay  them,  our  true  course  would  be  to  do  it  directly  from  the 
Treasury,  placing,  if  necessary,  a  million  of  dollars  annually  at  the 
disposal  of  the  British  government,  upon  the  simple  condition  that 


INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT.  79 

it  releases  us  from  all  claim  to  the  monopoly  of  publication. 
Such  a  release  would  be  cheap,  even  at  two  millions ;  enough  to 
give  $4,000  a  year  to  five  hundred  persons,  and  that  number 
would  certainly  include  all  who  can  even  fancy  us  under  any 
obligation  to  them.  My  own  impression  is,  that  no  such  payment 
is  required  by  justice,  either  as  regards  our  own  authors  or  foreign 
ones.  Of  the  former,  all  can  be  and  are  well  paid,  who  can  pro- 
duce books  that  the  public  are  willing  to  read,  and  no  law  that  could 
be  made  would  secure  payment  to  those  who  cannot.  Their  mo- 
nopoly extends  over  a  smaller  number  of  persons  than  does  the 
English  one ;  and  if  the  more  than  thirty  millions  of  people  who 
are  subject  to  the  latter  cannot  support  their  few  writers,  the 
cause  of  difficulty  is  to  be  found  at  home,  and  there  must  the 
remedy  be  applied.  Nevertheless,  by  adopting  the  course  sug- 
gested, we  should  certainly  free  ourselves  from  any  necessity  for 
choosing  between  the  payment  of  many  millions  annually  to 
authors  and  the  men  who  stand  between  them  and  the  public,  on 
the  one  hand,  and  of  dispensing  largely  with  the  purchase  of 
books,  on  the  other.  If  the  nation  must  pay,  the  fewer  persons 
through  whose  hands  the  money  passes  the  smaller  will  be  the 
cost  to'  it,  and  the  greater  the  gain  to  authors. 

The  ratification  of  the  treaty  would  impose  upon  us  a  very  large 
amount  of  taxation  that  must  inevitably  be  paid  either  in  money 
or  in  abstinence  from  intellectual  nourishment;  and  our  authors 
should  be  able  to  satisfy  themselves  that  the  advantage  to  them 
would  bear  some  proportion  to  the  loss  inflicted  upon  others. 
Would  it  do  so  ?  I  think  not.  On  the  contrary,  they  would  find 
their  condition  greatly  impaired.  All  publishers  prefer  copyright 
books,  because,  having  a  monopoly,  they  can  charge  monopoly 
profits.  To  obtain  a  copyright,  they  constantly  pay  considerable 
sums  at  home  for  editorship  of  foreign  books ;  but  from  the  mo- 
ment that  this  treaty  shall  take  effect,  the  necessity  for  doing  this 
will  cease,  and  thus  will  our  literary  men  be  deprived  of  one  con- 
siderable source  of  profit.  Again,  literary  labor  in  England  is 
cheap,  because  of  want  of  demand  ;  but  international  copyright, 
by  opening  to  it  our  vast  market,  will  quicken  the  demand,  and 
many  more  books  will  be  produced,  the  authors  of  all  of  which 
will  be  competitors  with  our  own,  who  will  then  possess  no  advan- 
tages over  them.  The  rates  of  American  authors  will  then  fall 
precisely  as  those  of  the  British  ones  will  rise  ;  and  this  result  will 


80  INTERNATIONAL   COPYRIGHT. 

be  produced  as  certainly  as  the  water  in  the  upper  chamber  of  a 
canal  lock  will  fall  as  that  in  the  lower  one  is  made  to  rise.  On 
one  side  of  the  Atlantic  literary  labor  is  well  paid,  and  on  the 
other  it  is  badly  paid.  International  copyright  will  establish  a 
level;  and  how  much  reason  our  authors  have  to  desire  that  it 
shall  be  established,  I  leave  it  for  them  to  determine. 

The  direct  tendency  of  the  system  now  proposed  will  be  found 
to  be  that  of  diminishing  the  domestic  competition  for  the  produc- 
tion of  books,  and  increasing  our  dependence  on  foreigners  for 
the  means  of  amusement  and  instruction ;  and  yet  the  confirma- 
tion of  the  treaty  is  urged  on  the  ground  that  it  will  increase  the 
first  and  diminish  the  last.  If  it  would  have  this  latter  effect,  it  is 
singular  that  the  authors  of  England  should  be  so  anxious  for  the 
measure  as  they  are.  It  is  not  usual  for  men  to  seek  to  diminish 
the  dependence  of  others  on  themselves. 

These,  however,  are,  as  I  think,  but  a  small  part  of  the  incon- 
veniences to  which  our  authors  are  now  proposing  to  subject  them- 
selves. They  have  at  present  a  long  period  allowed  them,  during 
which  they  have  an  absolute  monopoly  of  the  particular  forms  of 
words  they  offer  to  the  reading  public  ;  and  this  monopoly  has,  in 
a  very  few  years,  become  so  productive,  that  authorship  offers  per- 
haps larger  profits  than  any  other  pursuit  requiring  the  same 
amount  of  skill  and  capital.  Twenty  years  hence,  when  the  mar- 
ket shall  be  greatly  increased,  it  may,  and  as  I  think  will,  become 
a  question  whether  the  monopoly  has  not  been  granted  for  too 
long  a  period,  and  many  persons  may  then  be  found  disposed  to 
unite  with  Mr.  Macaulay  in  the  belief  that  the  disadvantages  of 
long  periods  preponderate  so  greatly  over  their  advantages,  as  to 
make  it  proper  to  retrace  in  part  our  steps,  limiting  the  monopoly 
to  twenty-one  years,  or  one  half  the  present  period.  The  inquiry 
may  then  come  to  be  made,  what  is  the  present  value  of  a  mo- 
nopoly of  forty-two  years,  as  compared  with  what  would  be  paid 
for  one  of  twenty-one  years ;  and  when  it  is  found  that,  in  nine 
hundred  and  ninety-nine  cases  out  of  a  thousand,  one  will  sell  for 
exactly  as  much  as  the  other,  it  will  perhaps  be  decided  that  no 
reason  exists  for  maintaining  the  present  law,  even  if  no  change 
be  now  made.  Suppose,  however,  the  treaty  to  be  confirmed, 
establishing  the  monopoly  of  foreigners  in  our  market,  and  that 
the  people  who  have  been  accustomed  to  consume  largely  of 
cheap  literature  now  find  themselves  deprived  of  it,  would  not  this 


INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT  81 

tend  to  hasten  the  period  at  which  the  existing  law  would  come 
under  consideration  ?  I  cannot  but  think  it  would.  The  common 
school  makes  a  great  demand  for  school-books,  and  both  make  a 
great  demand  for  newspapers.  All  of  these  combine  to  make  a 
demand  for  cheap  books  among  an  immense  and  influential  por- 
tion of  our  community,  that  cannot  yet  afford  to  pay  $1.25  for 
"  Fern  Leaves  "  or  for  the  "  Reveries  of  a  Bachelor,"  although 
they  can  well  afford  25  cents  for  a  number  of  "  Harper's  Maga- 
zine," or  for  "  Jane  Eyre."  Let  us  now  suppose  that  the  novels  of 
Dickens  and  Bulwer,  the  books  of  Miss  Aguilar,  and  those  of 
other  authors  with  which  they  have  been  accustomed  to  supply 
themselves,  should  at  once  be  raised  to  monopoly  prices  and  thus 
placed  beyond  their  reach,  would  it  not  produce  inquiry  into  the 
cause,  and  would  not  the  answer  be  that  we  had  given  English 
authors  a  monopoly  in  our  market  to  enable  our  own  to  secure  a 
monopoly  in  that  of  England  ?  Would  not  the  sufferers  next  in- 
quire by  what  process  this  had  been  accomplished,  seeing  that  the 
direct  representatives  of  the  people  had  always  been  so  firmly  op- 
posed to  it ;  and  would  not  the  answer  be  that  the  literary  men  of 
the  two  countries  had  formed  a  combination  for  the  purpose  of  tax- 
ing the  people  of  both ;  and  that  when  they  had  failed  to  accom- 
plish their  object  by  means  of  legislation,  they  had  induced  the 
Executive  to  interpose  and  make  a  law  in  their  favor,  in  defiance 
of  the  well-known  will  of  the  House  of  Representatives  ?  Under 
such  circumstances,  would  it  be  extraordinary  if  we  should,  within 
three  years  from  the  ratification  of  the  treaty,  see  the  commence- 
ment of  an  agitation  for  a  change  in  the  copyright  system  ?  It 
seems  to  me  that  it  would  not. 

The  time  for  the  arrival  of  this  agitation  would  probably  be 
hastened  by  an  extension  of  the  system  of  centralization  that 
would  next  be  claimed ;  for  the  present  measure  can  be  regarded 
as  little  more  than  the  entering  wedge  for  others.  France  and 
England  profit  enormously  by  setting  the  fashions  for  the  world. 
New  patterns  and  new  articles  are  invented  that  sell  in  the  first 
season  for  treble  or  quadruple  the  price  at  which  they  are  gladly 
supplied  in  the  second  ;  and  it  is  by  aid  of  the  perpetual  changes 
of  fashion  that  foreigners  so  much  control  our  markets.  Recently, 
our  manufacturers  have  been  enabled  to  reproduce  many  new  arti- 
cles in  very  short  time,  and  this  has  tended  greatly  to  reduce 
the  profits  of  foreigners,  who  are  of  course  dissatisfied.  Copyrights 


82  INTERNATIONAL   COPYRIGHT. 

are  now  granted  in  both  those  countries  for  new  patterns,  new 
forms  of  clothing,  &c.  &c.,  and  our  next  step  will  be  towards  the 
arrangement  of  a  treaty  for  securing  to  the  inventor  of  a  print, 
or  a  new  fashion  of  paletot,  the  monopoly  of  its  production  in 
our  markets ;  and  when  the  claim  for  this  shall  be  made,  it  will 
be  found  to  stand  on  precisely  the  same  ground  with  that  now 
made  in  behalf  of  the  producers  of  books,  and  must  be  granted. 
The  Frenchman  will  then  have  the  exclusive  right  of  supplying  us 
with  new  mousselines  de  laine,  and  the  Englishman  with  new  carpets 
and  new  forms  of  earthenware  ;  and  we  shall  be  told  that  that  is 
the  true  mode  of  developing  manufacturing  and  artistic  skill  among 
ourselves.  How  much  farther  the  system  may  be  carried  it  is 
difficult  to  tell,  for,  when  we  shall  once  have  established  the  system 
of  regulating  foreign  and  domestic  trade  by  treaty,  the  House  of 
Representatives  will  scarcely  be  troubled  with  much  discussion  of 
such  affairs.  Extremes  generally  meet,  and  it  will  be  extraordi- 
nary, if  progress  in  that  direction  shall  not  be  followed  by  progress 
in  the  other,  until  our  authors  shall,  at  length,  become  perfectly 
satisfied  of  the  accuracy  of  Mr.  Macaulay,  when  he  told  the  British 
authors,  then  claiming  an  extension  of  their  monopoly  to  sixty 
years,  that  "the  wholesome  copyright"  already  existing  would 
"  share  in  the  disgrace  and  danger  of  the  new  copyright "  they 
desired  to  create.1  They  could  scarcely  do  better  than  study  his 
speech  at  length.  At  present,  they  are  ill-advised,  and  their  best 
friends  will  be  those  senators  who,  like  Mr.  Macaulay,  shall  oppose 
their  literary  countrymen. 

Admitting,  however,  that  the  measure  proposed  should  not  in 
any  manner  endanger  existing  privileges,  what  would  be  the  gain 
to  our  authors  in  obtaining  the  control  of  the  British  market,  com- 
pared with  what  they  would  lose  from  surrendering  the  control  of 
our  own  ?  In  the  former,  the  sale  of  books  is  certainly  not  large. 
Few  have  been  more  popular  than  Tupper's  "  Proverbial  Philoso- 
phy," and  the  price  has  been,  as  I  learn,  only  7s.,  or  $1,68.  Never- 
theless, a  gentleman  fully  informed  in  regard  to  it  assures  me  that 
in  fifteen  years  the  average  sale  has  been  but  a  thousand  a  year, 
or  15,000  in  all.2  Compare  this  with  the  sale  of  a  larger  number 

1  Macaulay's  Speeches,  vol.  i.  p.  403. 

2  The  sale  here  has  been  200,000,  at  an  average  price  of  50  cents.    Had  it  been 
copyright,  the  price  would  have  been  double,  and  the  "  few  cents  "  would  have 
made  a  difference  on  this  single  book  of  $100,000.    The  same  gentleman  to  whom  I 


INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT.  83 

of  the  "  Reveries  of  a  Bachelor,"  or  of  thrice  the  quantity  of  "  Fern 
Leaves,"  at  but  little  lower  prices,  in  the  short  period  of  six  months, 
and  it  will  be  seen  how  inferior  is  the  foreign  market  to  the  domes- 
tic one.  Were  it  otherwise  —  were  the  market  of  Britain  equal  to 
our  own  —  could  it  be  that  we  should  so  rarely  hear  of  her  literary 
men,  dependent  on  their  own  exertions,  but  as  being  poor  and 
anxious  for  public  employment  ?  Were  it  otherwise,  should  we  need 
now  to  be  told  of  the  "  utter  destitution  "  of  the  widow  and  chil- 
dren of  Hogg,  so  widely  known  as  author  of  "  The  Queen's  Wake," 
and  as  "  The  Shepherd  "  of  "  Blackwood's  Magazine  ?  "  Assuredly 
not.  Had  literary  ability  been  there  in  the  demand  in  which  it 
now  is  here,  he  would  have  written  thrice  as  much,  would  have 
been  thrice  as  well  paid,  and  would  have  provided  abundantly  for 
his  widow  and  his  children.  Nevertheless,  our  authors  desire  to 
trade  off  this  great  market  for  the  small  one  in  which  he  shone  and 
left  his  family  to  starve,  and  thus  to  make  an  exchange  similar  to 
that  of  Glaucus  when  he  gave  a  suit  of  golden  armor  for  one  of 
brass. 

What,  however,  are  the  prospects  for  the  future  ?  Will  the 
British  market  grow  ?  It  would  seem  not,  for  death  and  emigra- 
tion are  diminishing  the  population,  and  the  people  who  remain 
are  in  a  state  of  constant  warfare  with  their  employers,  who 
promised  "  cheap  food  "  that  they  might  obtain  "  cheap  labor,"  and 
now  offer  low  wages  in  connection  with  high-priced  corn  and  beef. 
The  people  who  receive  such  wages  cannot  buy  books.  Hundreds 
of  thousands  of  persons  are  now  out  "  on  strike,"  or  are  "  locked 
out "  by  the  gentlemen  who  advocate  this  "  cheap  labor  "  system  ; 
and  the  result  of  all  this  extraordinary  cessation  from  labor  can  be 
none  other  than  the  continued  growth  of  poverty,  intemperance, 
and  crime.  The  picture  that  is  presented  by  that  country  is  one 
of  unceasing  discord  between  the  few  and  the  many,  in  which  the 
former  always  triumph ;  and  a  careful  examination  of  it  cannot 
result  in  leading  us  to  expect  an  increase  in  the  desire  to  purchase 
books,  or  in  the  ability  to  pay  for  them. 

Having  looked  upon  that  picture,  let  our  authors  next  look  to 

am  indebted  for  the  above  facts  informs  me  that  he  has  paid  to  the  author  of  a  12mo 
volume  of  200  pages  more  than  $23,000,  and  could  not  now  purchase  the  copyright 
for  $10,000;  that  for  another  small  12mo  volume  he  has  paid  $7,000,  and  expects 
to  pay  as  much  more ;  that  to  a  third  author  his  payments  for  the  year  have  been 
$2500,  and  are  likely  to  continue  at  that  rate  for  years  to  come;  and  that  it  would 
be  easy  to  furnish  other  and  numerous  cases  of  similar  kind. 


84  INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT. 

the  one  now  presented  by  this  country,  as  compared  with  that 
which  could  have  been  offered  forty,  thirty,  or  even  twenty  years 
since,  and  to  obtain  aid  in  understanding  the  facts  presented  to 
their  view,  let  them  read  the  following  extract  from  a  speech  re- 
cently delivered  by  Mr.  Cobden  :  — 

"You  cannot  point  to  an  instance  in  America,  where  the  people  are  more  edu- 
cated than  they  are  here,  of  total  cessation  from  labor  by  a  whole  community  or 
town,  given  over,  as  it  were,  to  desolation.  When  I  came  through  Manchester  the 
other  day,  I  found  many  of  the  most  influential  of  the  manufacturing  capitalists 
talking  very  carefully  upon  a  report  which  had  reached  them  from  a  gentleman  who 
was  selected  by  the  government  to  go  out  to  America,  to  report  upon  the  great  ex- 
hibition in  New  York.  That  gentleman  was  one  of  the  most  eminent  mechanicians 
and  machine-makers  in  Manchester,  a  man  known  in  the  scientific  world,  and  ap- 
preciated by  men  of  science,  from  the  astronomer  royal  downwards.  He  has  been 
over  to  America,  to  report  upon  the  progress  of  manufactures  and  the  state  of  the 
mechanical  arts  in  the  United  States,  and  he  has  returned.  No  report  from  him  to 
the  government  has  yet  been  published.  But  it  has  oozed  out  in  Manchester  that  he 
found  in  America  a  degree  of  intelligence  amongst  the  manufacturing  operatives,  a 
state  of  things  in  the  mechanical  arts,  which  has  convinced  him  that  if  we  are  to 
hold  our  own,  if  we  are  not  to  fall  back  in  the  rear  of  the  race  of  nations  we  must 
educate  our  people  to  put  them  upon  a  level  with  the  more  educated  artisans  of  the 
United  States.  We  shall  all  have  the  opportunity  of  judging  when  that  report  is  de- 
livered ;  but  sufficient  has  already  oozed  out  to  excite  a  great  interest,  and  I  might 
almost  say  some  alarm." 

Having  done  this,  let  them  next  ask  themselves  what  have  been 
the  causes  of  the  vast  change  in  the  relative  positions  of  the  two 
countries.  Doing  this,  will  not  the  answer  be,  common  schools, 
cheap  school-books,  cheap  newspapers,  and  cheap  literature  ?  Has 
not  each  and  every  one  of  these  aided  in  making  authors,  and  in 
creating  a  market  for  their  products  ?  Having  thus  laid  the 
foundation  of  a  great  edifice,  are  we  likely  to  stop  in  the  erection 
of  the  walls  ?  Having  in  so  brief  a  period  created  a  great  market 
for  literature,  is  it  not  certain  that  it  must  continue  to  grow  with 
increased  rapidity  ?  Assuredly  it  is ;  and  yet  it  is  that  vast  market 
that  our  authors  desire  to  barter  for  one  in  which  Hood  was 
permitted  almost  to  starve,  in  which  Leigh  Hunt,  Lady  Mor- 
gan, Miss  Mitford,  Tennyson,  and  Sir  Francis  Head  even  now 
submit  to  the  degradation  of  receiving  the  .public  charity  to 
the  extent  of  a  hundred  pounds  a  year!  The  law  as  it  now 
exists,  invites  foreign  authors  to  come  and  live  among  us,  and  par- 
ticipate in  our  advantages.  The  treaty  offers  to  tax  ourselves  for 
the  purpose  of  offering  them  a  bounty  upon  staying  at  home  and 
increasing  their  numbers  and  their  competition  with  the  well-paid 
literary  labor  of  this  country.  Were  Belgrave  Square  to  make  a 


INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT.  85 

treaty  with  Grub  Street,  providing  that  each  should  have  a  plate 
at  the  tables  of  the  other,  the  population  of  the  latter  would  prob- 
ably grow  as  rapidly  as  the  dinners  of  the  former  would  decline 
in  quality,  and  it  might  be  well  for  our  authors  to  reflect  if  such 
might  not  be  the  result  of  the  treaty  now  proposed. 

Its  confirmation  is,  as  I  understand,  urged  on  some  senators  on 
the  ground  that  consistency  requires  it.  Being  in  favor  of  pro- 
tection elsewhere,  they  are  told  that  it  would  be  inconsistent  to 
refuse  it  here.  In  reply  to  this,  it  might  fairly  be  retorted  that 
nearly  all  the  supporters  of  international  copyright  are  advocates 
of  the  system  called,  in  England,  Free  Trade ;  and  that  it  is  quite 
inconsistent  in  them  to  advocate  protection  here.  To  do  this 
would  however  be  as  unnecessary  as  it  would  be  unphilosophical. 
Both  are  perfectly  consistent.  Protection  to  the  farmer  and  planter 
in  their  efforts  to  draw  the  artisan  to  their  side,  looks  to  carrying 
out  the  doctrine  of  decentralization  by  the  annihilation  of  the  mo- 
nopoly of  manufactures  established  in  Britain ;  and  our  present 
copyright  system  looks  to  the  decentralization  of  literature  by  offer- 
ing to  all  who  shall  come  and  live  among  us  the  same  perfect 
protection  that  we  give  to  our  own  authors.  What  is  called  free 
trade  looks  to  the  maintenance  of  the  foreign  monopoly  for  sup- 
plying us  with  cloth  and  iron ;  and  international  copyright  looks 
to  continuing  the  monopoly  which  Britain  has  so  long  enjoyed  of 
furnishing  us  with  books ;  and  both  tend  towards  centralization. 

The  rapid  advance  that  has  been  made  in  literature  and  science 
is  the  result  of  the  perfect  protection  afforded  by  decentralization. 
Every  neighborhood  collects  taxes  to  be  expended  for  purposes  of 
education,  and  it  is  from  among  those  who  would  not  otherwise  be 
educated,  and  who  are  thus  protected  in  their  efforts  to  obtain  in- 
struction, that  we  derive  many  of  our  most  thoughtful  and  intelli- 
gent men,  and  our  best  authors.  The  advocates  of  free  trade  and 
international  copyright  are,  to  a  great  extent,  disciples  in  that 
school  in  which  it  is  taught  that  it  is  an  unjust  interference  with 
the  rights  of  property  to  compel  the  wealthy  to  contribute  to 
education  of  the  poor.  Common  schools,  and  a  belief  in  the  duty 
of  protection,  are  generally  found  together.  Decentralization,  by 
the  production  of  local  interests,  protects  the  poor  printer  in  his 
efforts  to  establish  a  country  newspaper,  and  thus  affords  to 
young  writers  of  the  neighborhood  the  means  of  coming  before 
the  world.  Decentralization  next  raises  money  for  the  establish- 


86  INTERNATIONAL   COPYRIGHT. 

ment  of  colleges  in  every  part  of  the  Union,  and  thus  protects  the 
poor  but  ambitious  student  in  his  efforts  to  obtain  higher  instruc- 
tion than  can  be  afforded  by  the  common  school.  Decentraliza- 
tion next  protects  him  in  the  manufacture  of  school-books,  by 
creating  a  large  market  for  the  productions  of  his  pen,  very 
much  of  which  is  paid  for  out  of  the  product  of  taxes  the  jus- 
tice of  which  is  denied  by  those  who  advocate  the  British  policy. 
Rising  to  the  dignity  of  author  of  books  for  the  perusal  of  already 
instructed  men  and  women  he  finds  himself  protected  by  an  abso- 
lute monopoly,  having  for  its  object  to  enable  him  to  provide  for 
himself,  his  wife,  and  his  children.  Of  all  the  people  of  the  Union, 
none  enjoy  such  perfect  protection  as  those  connected  with  litera- 
ture ;  yet  many  of  them  oppose  protection  to  all  others,  while 
actively  engaged  in  enlarging  and  extending  the  monopoly  they 
themselves  enjoy.  It  will  scarcely  answer  for  them  to  charge  in- 
consistency on  others. 

How  far  the  protection  already  granted  has  favored  the  devel- 
opment of  literary  tendencies,  may  be  judged  after  looking  to  the 
single  case  of  dramatic  writers,  who  are  not  protected  against  rep- 
resentation without  their  consent ;  and,  as  that  is  their,  mode  of 
publication,  it  follows  that  they  do  not  enjoy  the  -  advantages 
granted  to  other  authors.  The  consequence  is,  that  we  make  so 
little  progress  in  that  department  of  literature,  while  advancing 
rapidly  in  every  other.  Permit  me,  my  dear  sir,  to  suggest  that 
this  is  a  matter  worthy  of  your  attention.  There  would  seem  to 
be  no  good  reason  for  refusing  to  one  class  of  authors  what  we 
grant  so  freely  to  all  others. 

Whether  or  not  I  shall  have  convinced  you  that  international 
copyright  should  not  be  established,  I  cannot  say,  but  I  feel  quite 
safe  in  believing  that  you  must  be  convinced  it  is  a  question  which 
requires  to  be  publicly  and  fully  discussed  before  we  adopt  any 
action  looking  in  that  direction.  It  is  not  a  case  of  urgency.  If 
the  treaty  be  not  confirmed,  the  only  inconvenience  to  the  authors 
will  be  delay,  and  this  should  be  afforded,  were  it  only  to  enable 
them  to  reflect  at  leisure  upon  the  probable  consequences  of  the 
measure  in  aid  of  which  they  have  invoked  the  Executive  power. 
Should  they  continue  to  believe  their  interests  likely  -to  be  pro- 
moted by  the  adoption  of  such  a  measure  as  that  which  has  been 
so  pertinaciously  urged  the  doors  of  Congress  will  always  be  open 
to  them,  and  justice,  though  it  may  be  delayed,  will  assuredly  be 


INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT.  87 

done.  Let  them  proceed  in  a  constitutional  way,  and  then, 
should  their  desires  be  gratified,  they  will  have  the  satisfaction  of 
knowing  that  their  rights  have  been  admitted  after  full  and  fair  dis- 
cussion before  the  people.  Should  they  now  succeed  in  obtaining, 
in  secret  session,  the  confirmation  of  a  treaty  negotiated  in  private, 
and  in  haste,  they  will,  I  think,  "  repent  at  leisure  ; "  but  repent- 
ance may,  and  probably  will,  come  too  late.  The  mischief  will 
then  have  been  done. 

Having  now,  my  dear  sir,  to  the  best  of  my  ability,  complied 
with  your  request,  I  remain, 

Yours,  very  respectfully, 

HENRY  C.  CAREY. 

HON.  JAMES  COOPER.  Burlington,  Nov.  28,  1853. 


NOTE. 

DECEMBER  31, 1867. 

Mr.  Dickens's  tale  of  "  No  Thoroughfare  "  is  now  being  reprinted  here  in  daily  and 
weekly  journals,  and  to  such  extent  as  to  warrant  the  belief  that  the  number  in  the 
hands  of  readers  of  the  Union,  will  speedily  exceed  a  million;  obtained,  too,  at  a 
cost  so  small  as  scarcely  to  admit  of  calculation.  Under  a  system  of  International 
Copyright  a  similar  number  would,  at  the  least,  have  cost  $500,000.  At  50  cents, 
however,  the  sale  would  not  have  exceeded  50,000,  yielding  to  author  and  pub- 
lisher probably  $10,000.  Would  it  be  now  expedient  that,  to  enable  these  latter 
to  divide  among  themselves  this  small  amount,  the  former  should  tax  themselves 
in  one  so  greatly  larger?  Would  it  be  right  or  proper  that  they  should  so  do  in 
the  hope  that  American  novelists  and  poets  jshould  in  like  manner  be  enabled  to 
tax  the  British  people?  Outside  of  the  class  of  gentlemen  who  live  by  the  use  of 
their  pens,  there  are  few  who,  having  examined  the  question,  would,  it  is  believed, 
be  disposed  to  give  to  these  questions  an  affirmative  reply. 

Of  all  living  authors  there  is  none  that,  in  his  various  capacities  of  author,  edi- 
tor, and  lecturer,  is,  in  both  money  and  fame,  so  largely  paid  as  Mr.  Dickens.  That 
he  and  others  are  not  doubly  so  is  due  to  the  fact  that  British  policy,  from  before 
the  days  of  Adam  Smith,  has  tended  uniformly  to  the  division  of  society,  at  home  and 
abroad,  into  two  great  classes,  the  very  poor  becoming  daily  more  widely  separatep 
from  the  very  rich,  and  daily  more  and  more  unfitted  for  giving  support  to  British 
authors.  That  the  reader  may  understand  this  fully,  let  him  turn  to  recent  British 
journals  and  study  the  accounts  there  given  of  "  an  agricultural  gang  system," 
whose  horrors,  as  they  tell  their  readers,  "  make  the  British  West  Indies  almost  an 
Arcadia  "  when  compared  with  many  of  the  home  districts.  Next,  let  him  study  in 
the  "  Spectator,"  now  but  a  fortnight  old,  the  condition  of  the  630,000  wretched  peo- 
ple inhabiting  Eastern  London ;  and  especially  that  of  the  70,000  mainly  dependent 
on  ship  and  engine  building,  "  too  poor  to  go  afield  for  employment,  too  poor  to 
emigrate,  too  poor  to  do  any  thing  but  die,"  and  wholly  dependent  on  a  weekly  al- 
lowance per  house,  of  from  twenty  to  forty  cents  and  a  loaf  of  bread ;  that  allowance, 
wretched  as  it  is,  to  be  obtained  only  at  the  cost  of  "  standing  hours  among  crowds 


88  INTERNATIONAL  COPYRIGHT. 

made  brutal  by  misery  and  privation."  Further,  let  him  read  in  the  same  journal 
its  description  of  the  almost  universal  dishonesty  which  has  resulted  from  a  total 
repudiation  of  the  idea  that  international  morality  could  exist;  and  then  determine 
for  himself  if,  under  a  different  system,  Britain  might  not  have  made  at  home  a 
market  for  her  authors  that  would  far  more  than  have  compensated  for  deprivation 
of  that  on«  they  now  so  anxiously  covet  abroad. 

Seeking  further  evidence  in  reference  to  this  important  question,  let  him  then 
turn  to  the  "  North  British  Review  "  for  the  current  monih  and  study  the  social 
sores  of  Britain. 

For  more  than  a  century  she  has  been  sowing  the  wind,  carrying,  and  in  the  direct 
ratio  of  their  connection  with  her,  poverty  and  slavery  into  important  countries  of  the 
earth.  She  is  now  only  reaping  the  whirlwind.  When  her  literary  men  shall  have 
begun  to  teach  her  people  this —  when  they  shall  have  said  to  them  that  public  im- 
morality and  private  morality  cannot  co-exist  —  when  they  shall  have  commenced 
to  repudiate  the  idea  that  the  end  sanctifies  the  means  —  then,  but  not  till  then,  the 
time  may,  perhaps,  have  come  for  lecturing  the  world  on  the  moral  side  of  the 
question  of  International  Copyright.  To  this  moment,  so  far  as  the  writer's  memory 
serves  him,  no  one  of  them  has  yet  entered  on  the  performance  of  this  important 
work. 


MONEY: 


A  LECTURE 


DELIVERED  BEFORE  THE  NEW  YORK 


>e0pjl|kal  anfr  Ste&iieal 


THURSDAY,  FEBEUAEY,  1857. 


BY  HENRY  C.  CAEEY. 


REPRINTED  FROM  THE  MERCHANTS'  MAGAZINE  FOR  APRIL,  1857, 


PHILADELPHIA: 
HENKY   CAREY  BAIRD, 

No.  406  WALNUT  ST. 

1860. 


MONEY. 


1.  THE  single  commodity  that  is  of  universal  request  is  money.     Go 
where  we  may,  we  meet  persons  seeking  commodities  required  for  the 
satisfaction  of  their  wants,  yet  widely  differing  in  their  demands.     One 
needs  food ;  a  second,  clothing ;  a  third,  books,  newspapers,  horses,  or 
ships.     Many  desire  food,  yet  while  one  would  have  fish,  another  rejects 
the  fish  and  seeks  for  meat.     Offer  clothing  to  him  who  sought  for  ships, 
and  he  would  prove  to  have  been  supplied.     Place  before  the  seeker  after 
silks,  the  finest  lot  of  cattle,  and  he  will  not  purchase.     The  woman  of 
fashion  rejects  the  pantaloons;  while  the  porter  regards  her  slipper  as 
wholly  worthless.     Of  all  these  people,  nevertheless,  there  would  not  be 
found  even  a  single  one  unwilling  to  give  labor,  attention,  skill,  houses, 
bonds,  lands,  horses,  or  whatever  else  might  be  within  his  reach,  in  ex- 
change for  money — provided,  only,  that  the  quantity  offered  were  deemed 
sufficient. 

So  has  it  been  in  every  age,  and  so  is  it  everywhere.  Laplander  and 
Patagonian,  almost  the  antipodes  of  each  other,  are  alike  in  their  thirst  after 
the  precious  metals.  Midianite  merchants  paid  for  Joseph  with  so  many 
pieces  of  silver.  The  gold  of  Macedon  bought  the  services  of  Demosthenes ; 
and  it  was  thirty  pieces  or  silver  that  paid  for  the  treason  of  Judas.  African 
gold  enabled  Hannibal  to  cross  the  Alps ;  as  that  of  Spanish  America  has 
enabled  France  to  subjugate  so  large  a  portion  of  Northern  Africa.  Sov- 
ereigns in  the  East  heap  up  gold  as  provision  against  future  accidents ; 
and  finance  ministers  in  the  West,  rejoice  when  their  accounts  enable 
them  to  exhibit  a  full  supply  of  the  precious  metals.  When  it  is  other- 
wise the  highest  dignitaries  are  seen  paying  obsequious  court  to  the 
Rothschild  and  the  Baring,  controllers  of  the  supply  of  money.  So,  too, 
when  railroads  are  to  be  made,  or  steamers  to  be  built.  Farmers  and 
contractors,  landowners,  and  stockholders,  then  go,  cap  in  hand,  to  the 
Croesuses  of  Paris  and  London,  anxious  to  obtain  a  hearing,  and  desiring 
to  propitiate  the  man  of  power  by  making  whatsoever  sacrifice  may  seem 
to  be  required. 

2.  Were  a  hundred  ships  to  arrive  in  your  port  to-morrow,  a  single 
one  of  which  was  freighted  with  gold,  she  alone  would  find  a  place  in  the 
editorial  columns  of  your  journals — leaving  wholly  out  of  view  the  re- 
maining ninety-nine,  freighted  with  silks  and  teas,  cloth  and  sugar.     The 
news,  too,  would  find  a  similar  place  in  almost  all  the  journals  of  the 

3 


Money. 

Union,  and  for  the  reason,  that  all  their  readers,  the  "bears"  excepted, 
so  much  rejoice  when  money  comes  in,  and  so  much  regret  when  it  goes 
out.  Of  all  the  materials  of  which  the  earth  is  composed,  there  are  none 
so  universally  acceptable  as  gold  and  silver — none  in  whose  movements 
so  large  a  portion  of  every  community  feels  an  interest. 

Why  is  this  the  case  ?  Because  of  their  having  distinctive  qualities 
that  bring  them  into  direct  connection  with  the  distinctive  qualities  of 
man — facilitating  the  growth  of  association,  and  promoting  the  develop- 
ment of  individuality.  They  are  the  indispensable  instruments  of  society, 
or  commerce. 

That  they  are  so,  would  seem  to  be  admitted  by  those  journalists  when 
giving  to  their  movements  so  much  publicity ;  and  yet,  on  turning  to  an- 
other column,  you  would  probably  find  it  there  asserted,  that  all  this  anx- 
iety in  regard  to  money  was  evidence  of  ignorance — the  condition  of  man 
being  improved  by  parting  with  gold  that  he  can  neither  eat,  drink,  nor 
wear,  in  exchange  for  sugar  that  he  can  eat,  and  cloth  that  he  can  wear. 
Such  may  be  the  case,  says  one  reader,  but,  for  my  part,  I  prefer  to  see 
money  come  in,  because  when  it  does  so,  I  can  borrow  at  six  per  cent.; 
whereas,  when  it  is  going  out,  I  have  to  pay  ten,  twelve,  or  twenty.  This 
is  doubtless  true,  says  another,  but  I  prefer  to  see  money  arrive — being 
then  able  to  sell  my  hats  and  shoes,  and  to  pay  the  people  who  make 
them.  It  may  be  evidence  of  ignorance,  says  a  third,  but  I  always  rejoice 
when  money  flows  inwards,  for  then  I  can  always  sell  my  labor  j  whereas, 
when  it  flows  outwards,  I  am  unemployed,  and  my  wife  and  children  suf- 
fer for  want  of  food  and  clothing.  Men's  natural  instincts  look,  thus,  in 
one  direction,  while  mock  science  points  in  another.  The  first  should  be 
right,  because  they  are  given  of  God.  The  last  may  be  wrong — being  one 
among  the  weak  inventions  of  man.  Which  is  right,  we  may  now  inquire. 

3.  The  power  of  man  over  matter  is  limited  to  effecting  changes  of 
place  and  of  form.  For  the  one  he  needs  wagons,  horses,  ships,  and  rail- 
roads ;  for  the  other,  spades,  plows,  mills,  furnaces,  and  steam-engines. 
Among  men,  changes  of  ownership  are  to  be  effected,  and  for  that  purpose 
they  need  some  general  medium  of  circulation. 

The  machinery  of  exchange  in  use  is,  therefore  of  three  kinds — that 
required  for  producing  changes  of  place,  that  applied  to  effecting  changes 
of  form,  and  that  used  for  effecting  changes  of  ownership ;  and  were  we 
now  to  examine  the  course  of  proceeding  with  regard  to  them,  we  should 
find  it  to  be  the  same  in  all — thus  obtaining  proof  of  the  universality  of 
the  natural  laws  to  whose  government  man  is  subject.  For  the  present, 
however,  we  must  limit  ourselves  to  an  examination  of  the  phenomena  of 
the  machinery  of  circulation. 

In  the  early  periods  of  society,  man  has  little  to  exchange,  and  there 
are  few  exchanges — those  which  are  made  being  by  direct  barter — skins 
being  given  for  knives,  clothing,  meat,  or  fish.  With  the  progress  of  popu- 
lation and  wealth,  however,  all  communities  have  endeavored  to  facilitate 
the  transfer  of  property,  by  the  adoption  of  some  common  standard  with 
which  to  compare  the  value  of  the  commodities  to  be  exchanged — cattle 
having  thus  been  used  among  the  early  Greeks — while  slaves  and  cattle, 
or  "living  money,"  as  it  was  then  denominated,  were  commonly  in  use 


Money. 

among  the  Anglo-Saxons  —  wampum  among  our  aborigines  —  codfish 
among  the  people  of  New  England — and  tobacco  among  those  of  Vir- 
ginia. With  further  progress,  we  find  them  adopting  successively  iron, 
copper,  and  bronze,  preparatory  to  obtaining  silver  and  gold,  to  be  used 
as  the  machinery  for  effecting  exchanges  from  hand  to  hand. 

For  such  a  purpose,  the  recommendations  of  those  metals  are  very  great. 
Being  scantily  diffused  throughout  the  earth,  and  requiring,  therefore, 
much  labor  for  their  collection,  they  represent  a  large  amount  of  value — 
while  being  themselves  of  little  bulk,  and  therefore  capable  of  being 
readily  and  securely  stored,  or  transported  from  place  to  place.  Not  be- 
ing liable  to  rust  or  damage,  they  may  be  preserved  uninjured  for  any 
length  of  time,  and  their  quantity  is,  therefore,  much  less  liable  to  varia- 
tion than  is  that  of  wheat  or  corn,  the  supply  of  which  is  so  largely  de- 
pendent upon  the  contingencies  of  the  weather.  Capable  of  the  most 
minute  subdivision,  they  can  be  used  for  the  performance  of  the  smallest 
as  well  as  the  largest  exchanges;  and  we  all  know  well  how  large  an 
amount  of  commerce  is  effected  by  means  of  coins  of  one  and  of  three 
cents  that  would  have  to  remain  unaffected;  were  there  none  in  use  of  less 
value  than  those  of  five,  six,  and  ten  cents. 

To  facilitate  their  use,  the  various  communities  of  the  world  are  accus- 
tomed to  have  them  cut  into  small  pieces  and  weighed,  after  which  they 
are  so  stamped  aa  to  enable  every  one  to  discern  at  once  how  much  gold 
or  silver  is  offered  in  exchange  for  the  commodity  he  has  to  sell;  but  the 
value  of  the  piece  is  in  only  a  very  slight  degree  due  to  this  process  of 
coinage.*  In  the  early  periods  of  society,  all  the  metals  passed  in  lumps, 
requiring  of  course,  to  be  weighed ;  and  such  is  now  the  case  with  much 
of  the  gold  that  passes  between  America  and  Europe.  Q-old  dust  has  also 
to  be  weighed,  and  allowance  has  to  be  made-  for  the  impurities  with 
which  the  gold  itself  is  connected;  but  with  this  exception,  it  is  of  almost 
precisely  the  same  value  with  gold  passed  from  the  mint  and  stamped  with 
an  eagle,  a  head  of  Victoria,  or  of  Nicholas. 

4.  A  proper  supply  of  those  metals  having  been  obtained,  and  this 
having  been  divided,  weighed,  and  marked,  the  farmer,  the  miller,  the 
clothier,  and  all  other  members  of  society,  are  now  enabled  to  effect  ex- 
changes, even  to  the  exent  of  purchasing  for  a  single  cent  their  share  of 
the  labors  of  thousands,  and  tens  of  thousands,  of  men  employed  in  making 
railroads,  engines,  and  cars,  and  transporting  upon  them  annually  hun- 
dreds of  millions  of  letters;  or,  for  another  cent,  their  share  of  the  labor 
of  the  hundreds,  if  not  thousands,  of  men  who  have  contributed  to  the 
production  of  a  penny  newspaper.  The  mass  of  small  coin  is  thus  a  saving 
fund  for  labor,  because  it  facilitates  association  and  combination — giving 
utility  to  billions  of  millions  of  minutes  that  would  be  wasted,  did  not  a 
demand  exist  for  them  at  the  moment  the  power  to  labor  had  been  pro- 
duced. Labor  being  the  first  price  given  for  everything  we  value,  and 

*  The  heap  of  paper  in  the  mill  becomes  slightly  more  valuable  when  it  is 
counted  off  and  tied  up  in  reams,  and  the  heap  of  cloth  is  in  like  manner 
increased  in  value  when  it  is  measured  and  tied  up  in  pieces,  for  the  reason  that 
both  can  be  more  readily  exchanged.  Precisely  similar  to  this  is  the  increase 
of  value  resulting  from  the  process  of  coinage. 

5 


Money. 

being  the  commodity  that  all  can  offer  in  exchange,  the  progress  of  com- 
munities in  wealth  and  influence  is  in  the  direct  ratio  of  the  presence  or 
absence  of  an  instant  demand  for  the  forces,  physical  and  mental,  of  each 
and  every  man  in  the  community — resulting  from  the  existence  of  a  power 
on  the  part  of  each  and  every  other  man,  to  offer  something  valuable  in 
exchange  for  it.  It  is  the  only  commodity  that  perishes  at  the  instant  of 
production,  and  that,  if  not  then  put  to. use,  is  lost  forever. 

We  are  all  momently  producing  labor-power,  and  daily  taking  in  the 
fuel  by  whose  consumption  it  is  produced;  and  that  fuel  is  wasted  unless 
its  product  be  on  the  instant  usefully  employed.  The  most  delicate  fruits 
or  flowers  may  be  kept  for  hours  or  days;  but  the  force  resulting  from 
the  consumption  of  food  cannot  be  kept,  even  for  a  second.  That  the  in- 
stant power  of  profitable  consumption  may  be  coincident  with  the  instant 
production  of  this  universal  commodity,  there  must  be  incessant  combina- 
tion, followed  by  incessant  division  and  subdivision,  and  that  in  turn  fol- 
lowed by  an  incessant  recomposition.  This  is  seen  in  the  case  above 
referred  to,  where  miners,  furnace-men,  machine-makers,  rag- gatherers, 
carters,  bleachers,  paper-makers,  railroad  and  canal  men,  type-makers, 
compositors,  pressmen,  authors,  editors,  publishers,  newsboys,  and  hosts  of 
others,  combine  their  efforts  for  the  production  in  market  of  a  heap  of 
newspapers  that  has,  at  the  instant  of  production,  to  be  divided  off  into 
portions  suited  to  the  wants  of  hundreds  of  thousands  of  consumers.  Each 
of  these  latter  pays  a  single  cent — then  perhaps  subdividing  it  among 
half  a  dozen  others,  so  that  the  cost  is  perhaps  no  more  than  a  cent  per 
week;  and  yet  each  obtains  his  share  of  the  labors  of  all  of  the  persons  by 
whom  it  had  been  produced. 

Of  all  the  phenomena  of  society,'  this  process  of  division,  subdivision,  com- 
position, and  recomposition  is  the  most  remarkable ;  and  yet — being  a 
thing  of  such  common  occurrence — it  scarcely  attracts  the  slightest  no- 
tice. Were  the  newspaper  above  referred  to,  partitioned  off  into  squares, 
each  representing  its  portion  of  the  labor  of  one  of  the  persons  who  had 
contributed  to  the  work,  it  would  be  found  to  be  resolved  into  six,  eight, 
or  perhaps  even  ten  thousand  pieces,  of  various  sizes,  small  and  great — 
the  former  representing  the  men  who  had  mined  and  smelted  the  ores  of 
which  the  types  and  presses  had  been  composed,  and  the  latter  the  men 
and  boys  by  whom  the  distribution  has  been  made.  Numerous  as  are 
these  little  scraps  of  human  effort,  they  are  nevertheless,  all  combined  in 
every  sheet,  and  every  member  of  the  community  may — for  the  trivial 
sum  of  fifty  cents  per  annum — enjoy  the  advantage  of  the  information 
therein  contained;  and  as  fully  as  he  could  do,  had  it  been  collected  for 
himself  alone. 

Improvements  in  the  mode  of  transportation  are  advantageous  to  man, 
but  the  service  they  render,  when  compared  with  their  cost  is  very  small. 
A  ship  worth  forty  or  fifty  thousand  dollars  cannot  effect  exchanges  be- 
tween men  at  opposite  sides  of  the  Atlantic  to  an  extent  exceeding  five 
or  six  thousand  tons  per  annum;  whereas,  a  furnace  of  similar  cost  will 
effect  the  transmutation  of  thirty  thousand  tons'  weight  of  coal,  ore,  lime- 
stone, food,,  and  clothing,  into  iron.  Compared  with  either  of  these,  how- 
ever, the  commerce  effected  by  the  help  of  fifty  thousand  dollars'  worth 

6 


Money. 

of  little  white  pieces  representing  labor  to  the  extent  of  three  or  five  cents 
— labor  which  by  their  help  is  gathered  up  into  a  heap,  and  then  divided 
and  subdivided  day  after  day  throughout  the  year — and  it  will  be  found 
that  the  service  rendered  to  society,  in  economizing  force,  by  each  dollar's 
worth  of  money,  is  greater  than  is  rendered  by  hundreds,  if  not  thousands, 
employed  in  manufactures,  or  tens  of  thousands  in  ships  or  railroads  ;  and 
yet  there  are  able  writers  who  tell  us  that  money  is  so  much  "  dead  capi- 
tal"— being  "an  important  portion  of  the  capital  of  a  country  that  pro- 
duces nothing  for  the  country." 

"Money,  as  money,"  says  an  eminent  economist,  "satisfies  no  want,  an- 
swers no  purpose.  *  The  difference  between  a  country  with  money, 
and  a  country  altogether  without  it,  would,"  as  he  thinks,  "be  only  one  of 
convenience,  like  grinding  by  water  instead  of  by  hand."  A  ship,  as  a 
ship — a  road,  as  a  road — a  cotton-mill,  as  a  cotton-mill — in  like  manner, 
however,  "  satisfies  no  want,  answers  no  purpose."  They  can  be  neither 
eaten,  drunk,  nor  worn.  All,  however,  are  instruments  for  facilitating  the 
•work  of  association,  and  the  growth  of  man  in  wealth  and  power  is  in  the 
direct  ratio  of  the  facility  of  combination  with  his  follow-men.  To  what 
extent  they  do  so,  when  compared  with  money,  we  may  now  inquire.  To 
that  end,  let  us  suppose  that  by  some  sudden  convulsion  of  nature  all  the 
ships  of  the  world  were  at  once  annihilated,  and  remark  the  effect  pro- 
duced. The  ship-owners  would  loose  heavily ;  the  sailors  and  the  porters 
would  have  less  employment ;  and  the  price  of  wheat  would  temporarily 
fall  j  while  that  of  cloth  would,  for  the  moment  rise.  At  the  close  of  a 
single  year,  by  far  the  larger  portion  of  the  operations  of  society  would 
be  found  moving  precisely  as  they  had  done  before — commerce  at  homo 
having  taken  the  place  of  that  abroad.  Cotton  and  tropical  fruits  would 
be  less  easily  obtained  in  Northern  climes,  and  ice  might  be  more  scarce 
in  Southern  ones ;  but,  in  regard  to  the  chief  exchanges  of  a  society  like 
our  own,  there  would  be  no  suspension,  even  for  a  single  instant.  So  far, 
indeed,  would  it  be  to  the  contrary,  that  in  many  countries  commerce 
would  be  far  more  active  than  it  had  been  before — the  loss  of  ships  pro- 
ducing a  demand  for  the  opening  of  mines,  for  the  construction  of  furnaces 
and  engines,  and  for  the  building  of  mills,  that  would  make  a  market  for 
labor,  mental  and  physical,  such  as  had  never  before  been  known. 

Let  us  next  suppose  that  the  ships  had  been  spared,  and  that  all  the 
gold  and  silver,  coined  and  not  coined,  mined  and  not  mined,  were  anni- 
hilated, and  study  the  effect  that  would  be  produced.  The  reader  of 
newspapers — finding  himself  unable  to  pay  for  them  in  beef  or  butter, 
cloth  or  iron — would  be  compelled  to  dispense  with  his  usual  supply  of 
intelligence,  and  the  journal  would  be  no  longer  printed.  Omnibuses 
would  cease  to  run  for  want  of  sixpences  ;  and  places  of  amusement  would 
be  closed,  for  want  of  shillings.  Commerce  among  men  would  be  at  an 
end,  except  so  far  as  it  might  be  found  possible  to  effect  direct  exchanges, 
food  being  given  for  labor,  or  wool  for  cloth.  Such  exchanges  could, 
however,  be  few  in  number,  and  men,  women,  and  children  would  perish 
by  millions,  because  of  inability  to  obtain  food  and  clothing  in  exchange 
for  service.  Cities  whose  population  now  counts  by  hundreds  of  thou- 
sands would,  before  the  close  of  a  single  year,  exhibit  hundreds  of  blocks 

7 


Money. 

of  unoccupied  buildings,  and  the  grass  would  grow  in  their  streets.  A 
substitute  might,  it  is  true,  be  found — men  returning  to  the  usages  of 
those  primitive  times  when  wheat  or  iron,  tobacco  or  copper,  constituted 
the  medium  of  exchange;  but  under  such  circumstances,  society,  as  at 
present  constituted,  could  have  no  existence.  A  pound  of  iron  would  be 
required  to  pay  for  a  Tribune  or  a  Herald,  and  hundreds  of  tons  of  any 
of  the  commodities  above  referred  to,  would  be  needed  for  the  purchase 
of  the  weekly  emission  of  either.  Tons  of  them  would  be  needed  to  pay 
for  the  food  consumed  in  a  single  eating-house,  or  the  amusement  fur- 
nished in  a  single  theatre;  and  how  the  wheat,  the  iron,  the  corn,  or  the 
copper  could  be  fairly  divided  among  the  people  who  had  contributed  to 
the  production  of  the  journal,  the  food,  or  the  amusement,  would  be  a 
problem  entirely  incapable  of  solution. 

The  precious  metals  are  to  the  social  body  what  atmospheric  air  is  to 
the  physical  one.  Both  supply  the  machinery  of  circulation,  and  the  re- 
solution of  the  physical  body  into  its  elements  when  deprived  of  the  one 
is  not  more  certain  than  is  that  of  the  social  body  when  deprived  of  the 
other.  In  both  these  bodies  the  amount  of  force  is  dependent  upon  the 
rapidity  of  circulation.  That  it  may  be  rapid,  there  must  be  a  full  supply 
of  the  machinery  by  means  of  which  it  is  to  be  effected ;  and  yet  there 
are  distinguished  writers  who  mourn  over  the  cost  of  maintaining  the  cur- 
rency, as  if  it  were  altogether  lost,  while  expiating  on  the  advantages  of 
canals  and  railroads — not  perceiving,  apparently,  that  the  money  that  can 
be  carried  in  a  bag,  and  that  scarcely  loses  in  weight  with  a  service  of 
half  a  dozen  years,  effects  more  exchanges  than  could  be  effected  by  a 
fleet  of  ships,  many  of  which  would  be  rotting  on  the  shores  on  which 
they  had  been  stranded,  at  the  close  of  such  a  period  of  service,  while  the 
remainder  would  already  have  lost  half  of  their  original  value.* 

Of  all  the  labor-saving  machinery  in  use,  there  is  none  that  so  much 
economizes  human  power,  and  so  much  facilitates  combination,  as  that 
known  by  the  name  of  money.  Wealth,  or  the  power  of  man  to  com- 
mand the  services  of  nature  grows  with  every  increase  in  the  facility  of 
combination — this  latter  growing  with  the  growth  of  the  ability  to  com- 
mand the  aid  of  the  precious  metals.  Wealth,  then,  should  increase  most 
rapidly  where  that  ability  is  most  complete. 

5.  The  power  of  a  commodity  to  command  money  in  exchange  is 
called  its  PRICE.  Prices  fluctuate  with  changes  of  time  and  place — wheat 
being  sometimes  low,  and  at  others  high — and  cotton  commanding  in  one 
country  thrice  the  quantity  of  silver  that  would  be  given  for  it  in  another. 
In  one  place,  much  money  is  required  to  be  given  for  a  little  cloth ; 
whereas,  in  another,  much  cloth  may  be  obtained  for  little  money.  What 
are  the  causes  of  all  these  differences,  and  what  the  circumstances  which 
tend  to  affect  prices  generally,  we  may  now  inquire. 

*  A  three-cent  piece,  changing  hands  ten  times  in  a  day,  effects  exchanges  in 
a  year  to  the  extent  of  $100 ;  or,  if  we  take  both  sides  of  the  exchanges,  to  that 
of  $200.  Two  thousand  such  pieces — costing  $60 — engaged  in  circulating  bread 
at  home,  are  capable  of  maintaining  a  greater  amount  of  commerce  than  can  be 
maintained  by  a  ship  that  has  cost  $30,000,  engaged  in  effecting  exchanges 
between  the  producers  of  cloth  in  Manchester  and  tea  in  China. 

8 


Money, 

A  thousand  tons  of  rags  at  the  Rocky  Mountains  would  not  exchange 
for  a  piece  of  silver  of  the  smallest  conceivable  size  ;  whereas,  a  quire  of 
paper  would  command  a  piece  so  large  that  it  would  weigh  an  ounce, 
Passing  thence  eastward,  and  arriving  in  the  plains  of  Kansas,  their  rela- 
tive values,  measured  in  silver,  would  be  found  so  much  to  have  changed, 
that  the  price  of  the  rags  would  pay  for  many  reams  of  the  paper.  Com- 
ing to  St.  Louis,  a  further  change  would  be  experienced — rags  having 
again  risen  and  paper  having  again  fallen.  Such,  too,  would  prove  to  be 
the  case  at  every  stage  of  the  progress  eastward — the  raw  material  steadily 
gaining,  and  the  finished  commodity  losing,  in  price,  until,  at  length,  in 
the  heart  of  Massachusetts,  three  pounds  of  rags  would  be  found  to  com- 
mand more  silver  than  would  be  needed  for  the  purchase  of  a  pound  of 
paper.  The  changes  of  relation  thus  observed  are  exhibited  in  the  fol- 
lowing diagram  : — 


Paper. 


Massachusetts. 


Rags. 


The  price  of  raw  materials  tends  to  rise  as  we  approach  those  places  in 
which  wealth  most  exists — those  in  which  man  is  most  enabled  to  associate 
with  his  fellow-man,  for  obtaining  power  to  direct  the  forces  of  nature  to 
his  service.  The  prices  of  finished  commodities  move  in  a  direction  ex- 
actly opposite — tending  always  to  decline  as  those  of  raw  materials  advance. 
Both  tend  thus  to  approximate — the  highest  prices  of  the  one  being  always 
found  in  connection  with  the  lowest  of  the  other;  and  in  the  strength  of 
the  movement  in  that  direction  will  be  found  the  most  conclusive  evidence 
of  advancing  civilization  and  growing  commerce. 

That  all  the  facts  are  in  entire  accordance  with  this  view,  will  be  obvi- 
ous to  those  who  remark  that  cotton  is  low  in  price  at  the  plantation,  and 
high  in  Manchester  or  Lowell ;  whereas,  cloth  is  cheaper  in  Lowell  than 
it  is  in  Alabama  or  Louisiana.  Corn,  in  Illinois,  is  frequently  so  cheap 
that  a  bushel  is  given  in  exchange  for  the  silver  required  to  pay  for  a  yard 
of  the  coarsest  cotton  cloth  ;  whereas,  at  Manchester,  it  is  so  dear  that  it 
pays  for  a  dozen  yards.  The  English  farmer  profits  doubly — obtaining 
much  cloth  for  his  corn,  while  increasing  the  quantity  of  corn  by  help  of 
the  manure  that  is  furnished  by  his  competitor  of  the  West.  The  latter 
loses  doubly — giving  much  corn  for  little  cloth,  and  adding  thereto  the 
manure  yielded  by  the  consumption  of  his  corn,  to  the  loss  of  which  is 
due>the  unceasing  diminution  of  the  powers  of  his  land. 

Looking  backward  in  time,  we  obtain  results  precisely  similar  to  those 

«7 


Money. 

obtained  in  passing  from  countries  in  which  associated  men  are  found,  and 
in  which,  consequently,  wealth  abounds,  to  those  in  which  they  are  widely 
scattered,  and  in  which  they  are,  therefore,  weak  and  poor.  At  the  close 
of  the  fifteenth  century,  eight  ecclesiastics,  attending  the  funeral  of  Anne 
of  Brittany,  were  royally  entertained  at  a  cost  of  3.13  francs,  of  money  of 
our  time ;  while  the  silk  used  on  that  occasion  is  charged  at  25  francs. 
The  same  quantity  of  silk  could  now  be  purchased  for  less  than  a  franc 
and  a  half — a  sum  that  would  be  entirely  insufficient  to  pay  for  a  single 
dinner.  The  owner  of  four  quires  of  paper  could  then  obtain  for  it  more 
money  than  was  required  for  the  purchase  of  a  hog,  and  less  than  two 
reams  were  needed  for  that  of  a  bull.  In  England,  hogs,  sheep,  and  corn 
were  cheap,  and  were  exported,  while  cloth  was  dear,  and  was  therefore 
imported.  Coming  down  to  a  more  recent  period,  the  early  portion  of 
the  last  century,  we  find  that  corn  and  wool  were  cheap,  while  cloth  and 
iron  were  dear ;  whereas,  at  the  close  of  the  century,  the  former  were 
becoming  dearer  from  day  to  day,  while  the  latter  were  as  regularly  be- 
coming cheaper. 

6.  Raw  material  tends,  with  the  progress  of  men  in  wealth  and  civiliza- 
tion, to  rise  in  price.  What,  however,  is  raw  material  ?  In  answer  to 
this  question,  we  may  say,  that  all  the  products  of  the  earth  are,  in  their 
turn,  finished  commodity  and  raw  material.  Coal  and  ore  are  the  finished 
commodity  of  the  miner,  and  yet  they  are  only  the  raw  material  of  which 
pig-iron  is  made.  The  latter  is  the  finished  commodity  of  the  smelter, 
and  yet  it  is  but  the  raw  material  of  the  puddler,  and  of  him  who  rolls 
the  bar.  The  bar,  again,  is  the  raw  material  of  sheet-iron — that,  in  turn, 
becoming  the  raw  material  of  the  nail  and  the  spike.  These,  in  time, 
become  the  raw  material  of  the  house,  in  the  diminished  cost  of  which 
are  found  concentrated  all  the  changes  that  have  been  observed  in  the 
various  stages  of  passage  from  the  rude  ore — lying  useless  in  the  earth — 
to  the  nail  and  the  spike,  the  hammer  and  the  saw,  required  for  the  com- 
pletion of  a  modern  dwelling. 

In  the  early  and  barbarous  ages  of  society,  land  and  labor  are  very  low 
in  price,  and  the  richest  deposits  of  coal  and  ore  are  worthless.  Houses 
being  then  obtained  with  exceeding  difficulty,  men  are  forced  to  depend 
for  shelter  against  wind  and  rain  upon  holes  and  caves  they  find  existing 
in  the  earth.  In  time,  they  are  enabled  to  combine  their  efforts ;  and 
with  every  step  in  the  course  of  progress,  land  and  labor  acquire  power 
to  command  money  in  exchange,  while  the  house  loses  it.  As  the  ser- 
vices of  fuel  are  more  readily  commanded,  pig-iron  is  more  easily  obtained. 
Both,  in  turn,  facilitate  the  making  of  bars  and  sheets,  nails  and  spikes, 
and  all  of  these  facilitate  the  creation  of  boats,  ships,  and  houses ;  but 
each  and  every  of  these  improvements  tends  to  increase  the  prices  of  the 
original  raw  materials — land  and  labor.  At  no  period  in  the  history  of 
the  world  has  the  general  price  of  these  latter  been  so  high  as  in  the 
present  one ;  at  none  would  the  same  quantity  of  money  have  purchased 
so  staunch  a  boat,  so  fleet  a  ship,  or  so  comfortable  a  house. 

The  more  finished  a  commodity,  the  greater  is  the  tendency  to  a  fall  of 
price — all  the  economies  of  the  earlier  processes  being  accumulated  to- 
gether in  the  later  ones.  Houses,  thus,  profit  by  all  improvements  in  the 

10 


Money, 

making  of  bricks,  in  the  quarrying  of  stone,  in  the  conversion  of  lumber, 
and  in  the  working  of  the  metals.  So,  too,  is  it  with  articles  of  clothing 
— every  improvement  in  the  various  processes  of  spinning,  weaving,  and 
dyeiflg,  and  in  the  conversion  of  clothing  into  garments,  being  found 
gathered  together  in  the  coat — the  more  numerous  those  improvements, 
the  lower  being  its  price,  and  the  higher  that  of  the  land  and  labor  to 
which  the  wool  is  due. 

With  every  stage  of  progress  in  that  direction,  there  is  an  increasing 
tendency  towards  an  equality  in  the  prices  of  the  more  and  the  less  fin- 
ished commodities — and  towards  an  approximation  in  the  character  of  the 
books,  clothing,  furniture,  and  dwellings  of  the  various  portions  of  society; 
with  constant  increase  in  power  to  maintain  commerce  between  those 
countries  which  do,  and  those  which  do  not,  yield  the  metals  which  con- 
stitute the  raw  material  of  money. 

For  proof  of  this,  we  may  look  to  any  of  the  advancing  communities  of 
the  world.  In  the  days  when  the  French  peasant  would  have  been  re- 
quired to  give  an  ox  for  a  ream  and  a  half  of  paper,  wine  was  much  higher 
than  it  is  at  present — peaches  were  entirely  unattainable— the  finer  vege- 
tables now  in  use  were  utterly  unknown — a  piece  of  refined  sugar,  or  a  cup 
of  tea  or  coffee,  were  luxuries  fit  for  kings  alone — and  an  ell  of  Dutch 
linen  exchanged  for  the  equivalent  of  60  francs — $11  25.  Now — the 
price  of  meat  having  wonderfully  increased — the  farm  laborer  is  better 
paid ;  and  the  consequences  are  seen  in  the  fact,  that  with  the  price  of  an 
ox  the  farmer  can  purchase  better  wine  than  then  was  drunk  by  kings — 
that  he  can  obtain  not  only  paper,  but  books  and  newspapers — that  he 
can  eat  apricots  and  peaches — that  sugar,  tea,  and  coffee  have  become 
necessaries  of  life — and  that  he  can  have  a  supply  of  linen  which  would, 
in  earlier  times,  have  almost  sufficed  for  the  entire  household  of  a  noble- 
man. Such  are  the  results  of  an  increase  in  the  facility  of  association 
and  combination  among  men ;  and  if  we  now  desire  to  find  the  instrument 
to  which  they  are  most  indebted  for  the  power  to  combine  their  efforts,  we 
must  look  for  it  in  that  to  which  we  have  given  the  name  of  money.  Sueh 
being  the  case,  it  becomes  important  that  we  ascertain  what  are  the  cir- 
cumstances under  which  the  power  to  command  the  use  of  that  instrument 
increases,  and  what  are  those  under  which  it  declines. 

7.  To  acquire  dominion  over  the  various  natural  forces  provided  for  his 
use,  is  both  the  pleasure  and  the  duty  of  man ;  and  the  greater  the  amount 
acquired,  the  higher  becomes  his  labor,  and  the  greater  is  the  tendency  to 
increase  of  power.  With  each  addition  thereto,  he  finds  less  resistance 
to  his  further  efforts;  and  hence  it  is,  that  each  successive  discovery 
proves  to  be  but  the  precursor  of  newer  and  greater  ones.  Franklin's 
lightning-rod  was  but  the  preparation  for  the  telegraph-wires  that  connect 
our  cities;  and  they,  in  turn,  are  but  the  precursors  of  those  destined 
soon  to  enable  us  to  read,  at  the  breakfast-table,  an  account  of  the  occur- 
rences of  the  previous  day  in  Europe,  Asia,  and  Australia.  Each  succes- 
sive year  thus  augments  the  power  of  man,  and  with  every  new  discovery 
utility  is  given  to  forces  that  now  are  being  wasted.  The  more  they  are 
utilized — the  more  nature  is  made  to  labor  in  man's  service — the  less  is 
the  quantity  of  human  effort  required  for  the  reproduction  of  the  com- 

11 


Money. 

modities  needed  for  his  comfort,  convenience,  or  enjoyment — the  less  is 
the  value  of  all  previous  accumulations— and  the  greater  is  the  tendency 
towards  giving  to  the  labor  of  the  present,  power  over  the  capital  created 
by  the  labors  of  the  past. 

Utility  is  the  measure  of  man's  power  over  nature.  The  greater  it  is, 
the  larger  is  the  demand  for  the  commodity  or  thing  utilized,  and  the 
greater  the  attractive  force  exerted  upon  it,  wherever  found.  Look  where 
we  may,  we  see  that  every  raw  material  yielded  by  the  earth  tends  towards 
those  places  at  which  it  has  the  highest  utility,  and  that  there  it  is  the 
value  of  the  finished  article  is  least.*  Wheat  tends  towards  the  grist- 
mill, and  there  it  is  that  flour  is  cheapest.  Cotton  and  wool  tend  towards 
the  mills  at  which  they  are  to  be  spun  and  woven,  and  there  it  is  that  the 
smallest  quantity  of  money  will  purchase  a  yard  of  cloth.  On  the  other 
hand,  it  is  where  cotton  has  the  least  utility — on  the  plantation — that 
cloth  has  the  highest  value.  Therefore  it  is,  that  we  see  communities  so 
universally  prospering  when  the  spindle  and  the  loom  are  brought  to  the 
neighborhood  of  the  plough  and  the  harrow,  to  utilize  their  products. 

Precisely  similar  to  this  are  the  facts  observed  in  regard  to  the  precious 
metals,  everywhere  on  the  earth's  surface  seen  to  be  tending  towards  those 
places  at  which  they  have  the  highest  utility — those  at  which  men  most 
combine  their  efforts  for  utilizing  the  raw  products  of  the  earth — those  in 
which  land  most  rapidly  acquires  a  money  value,  or  price — those,  there- 
fore, in  which  the  value  of  those  metals,  as  compared  with  land,  most 
rapidly  diminishes — and  those  in  which  the  charge  for  the  use  of  money 
is  lowest.  They  tend  to  leave  those  places  in  which  their  utility  is  small, 
and  in  which  combination  of  action  least  exists-i— those,  therefore,  in  which 
the  price  of  land  is  low,  and  the  rate  of  interest  high.  In  the  first,  there 
is  a  daily  tendency  towards  increase  in  the  freedom  of  man ;  whereas,  in 
the  last,  the  tendency  is  in  the  opposite  direction — towards  the  subju- 
gation of  man  to  the  control  of  those  who  live  by  the  expenditure  of  taxes, 
rent,  and  interest.  Desiring  evidence  of  this,  we  have  but  to  look  around 
us  at  the  present  moment,  and  see  how  oppressively  rent  and  interest  ope- 
rate upon  the  poorer  portions  of  society — how  numerous  are  the  applica- 
tions for  the  smallest  office — and,  above  all,  how  great  has  been  the  increase 
of  pauperism  in  the  past  three  years,  in  which  our  exports  of  specie  have 
been  so  large. 

Looking  to  Mexico  or  Peru,  to  California  or  Siberia,  we  see  but  little 
of  that  combination  of  action  required  for  giving  utility  to  their  metallic 
products — little  value  in  land — and  interest  higher  than  in  any  other  or- 
ganized communities  in  the  world.  Following  those  products,  we  see  them 
passing  gradually  through  the  West,  towards  the  cities  of  the  Atlantic,  or 
through  Russia  to  St.  Petersburg — every  step  of  their  progress  being  to- 
wards those  States  or  countries  in  which  they  have  the  greatest  utility — 
those  in  which  combination  of  action  most  exists,  and  in  which,  therefore, 
man  is  daily  acquiring  power  over  the  various  forces  of  nature,  and  com- 

*  "Calue  is  the  measure  of  the  obstacle  interposed  by  nature  to  the  gratification 
of  the  wishes  of  man. 

12 


Money. 

polling  her  more  and  more  to  aid  him  in  his  efforts  for  the  attainment  of 
further  power. 

8.  For  more  than  a  century,  Great  Britain  constituted  the  reservoir 
into  which  wUs  discharged  the  major  part  of  the  gold  and  silver  produced 
throughout  the  world.    There  it  was,  that  the  artisan  and  the  farmer  were 
most  nearly  brought  together — the  power  of  association  most  existed — 
the  ultimate  raw  materials  of  commodities,  land  and  labor,  were  most 
utilized,  and  the  consumption  in  the  arts,  of  gold  and  silver,  was  the  great- 
est.*   Now  the  state  of  things  is  widely  different.     From  year  to  year, 
the  land  of  the  United  Kingdom  has  become  more  consolidated — the  little 
proprietor  having  been  superseded  by  the  great  middleman  farmer,  and 
the  mere  day-laborer ;  and  the  result  is  seen  in  the  fact,  that  Great  Brit- 
ain has  passed  from  being  a  place  at  which  commodities  are  produced,  to 
be  given  in  exchange  for  the  produce  of  other  lands — to  being  a  mere 
place  of  exchange  for  the  people  of  those  lands.     With  each  successive 
year,  there  is  a  decline  in  the  proportion  borne  to  the  whole  population 
by  the  producing  classes,  and  an  increase  in  that  borne  by  the  non-pro- 
ducing ones,  with  corresponding  diminution  in  the  power  to  retain  the 
products  of  the  mines  of  Peru  and  Mexico. 

The  gold  of  California  does  not,  as  we  know,  to  any  material  extent,  re- 
main among  ourselves.  Touching  our  Atlantic  coast,  only  to  be  transferred 
to  steamers  that  bear  it  off  to  Great  Britain,  it  there  meets  the  product  of 
the  Australian  mines — the  two  combined  amounting  to  more  than  a  hun- 
dred millions  of  dollars  a  year.  Both  come  there,  however,  merely  in 
transit — being  destined,  ultimately,  to  the  payment  of  the  people  of  Con- 
tinental Europe,  who  have  supplied  raw  products  that  have  been  converted 
and  exported,  or  finished  ones  that  have  been  consumed.  Much  of  it  goes 
necessarily  to  France,  whose  exports  have  grown,  in  the  short  period  of 
twenty  years,  from  500,000,000  francs,  to  1,400,000,000,  and  have  steadily 
maintained  their  commercial  character.  Manufactures  are  there  the  hand- 
maids of  agriculture;  whereas  in  the  United  Kingdom,  they  are,  with 
each  successive  year,  becoming  more  and  more  the  substitutes  for  it.  To 
a  small  quantity  of  cotton,  silk,  and  other  raw  products  of  distant  lands, 
France  adds  a  large  amount  of  the  produce  of  her  farms — thus  entitling 
herself  not  only  to  receive,  but  to  retain  for  her  own  uses  and  purposes, 
nearly  all  the  commodities  that  come  to  her  from  abroad.  Her  position 
is  that  of  the  rich  and  enlightened  farmer,  who  sells  his  products  in  their 
highest  form— thus  qualifying  himself  for  applying  to  the  support  of  his 
family,  the  education  of  his  children,  and  the  improvement  of  his  land, 
the  whole  of  the  commodities  received  in  exchange.  That  of  Britain  is  the 
position  of  the  trader,  who  passes  through  his  hands  a  large  amount  of 
property,  of  which  he  is  entitled  to  retain  the  amount  of  his  commission, 
and  nothing  more.  The  one  has  immense,  and  wonderfully  growing  com- 
merce, while  the  other  performs  a  vast  amount  of  trade. 

9.  The  precious  metals  are  steadily  flowing  to  the  north  and  east  of 
Europe,  and  among  the  largest  of  their  recipients  we  find  Northern  Ger- 

*  Thirty  y«ars  since,  the  annual  consumption  of  the  precious  metals  in  Great 
Britain  was  estimated  at  £2,500,000,  or  $12,000,000. 

13 


Money. 

many,  now  so  rapidly  advancing  in  wealth,  power,  and  civilization.  Den- 
mark and  Sweden,  Austria  and  Belgium,  following  in  the  lead  of  France, 
in  the  maintenance  of  the  policy  of  Colbert,  are  moving  in  the  same  di- 
rection; and  the  consequences  are  seen  in  a  growing  habit  of  association, 
attended  with  daily  augmentation  in  the  amount  of  production,  and  in  the 
facility  of  accumulation,  as  exhibited  in  the  building  of  mills,  the  opening 
of  mines,  the  construction  of  roads,  and  the  constantly  augmenting  power 
to  command  the  services  of  the  precious  metals. 

The  causes  of  these  phenomena  are  readily  explained.  Raw  materials 
of  every  kind  tend  towards  those  places  at  which  employments  are  most 
diversified,  because  there  it  is  that  the  products  of  the  farm  command  the 
largest  quantity  of  money.  Gold  and  silver  follow  in  the  train  of  raw 
materials ;  and  for  the  reason,  that  where  the  farmer  and  the  artisan  are 
most  enabled  to  combine,  finished  commodities  are  always  cheapest.  When 
Germany  exported  corn  and  wool,  they  were  cheap,  and  she  was  required 
to  export  gold  to  aid  in  paying  for  the  cloth  and  paper  she  imported;  be- 
cause they  were  very  dear.  Now  she  imports  both  wool  and  rags ;  her 
farmers  obtain  high  prices  for  their  products,  and  are  enriched ;  and  the 
gold  comes  to  her,  because  cloth  and  paper  are  so  cheap  that  she  sends 
them  to  the  most  distant  quarters  of  the  world.  So  is  it  with  France, 
Belgium,  Sweden,  and  Denmark — all  of  which  are  large  importers  of  raw 
materials,  and  of  gold.  In  all  those  countries,  raw  materials  rise  in  price; 
and  the  greater  the  tendency  to  rise,  the  more  rapidly  must  the  current  of 
the  precious  metals  set  in  that  direction.  The  country  that  desires  to  in- 
crease its  supplies  of  gold,  and  thus  lower  the  price  of  money,  is,  therefore, 
required  to  pursue  that  course  of  policy  tending  most  to  raise  the  prices 
of  raw  material,  and  lower  those  of  manufactures.  This,  however,  is  di- 
rectly the  opposite  of  the  policy  advocated  by  the  British  school,  which 
seeks,  in  the  cheapening  of  all  the  raw  material  of  manufactures,  the  means 
of  advancing  civilization. 

10.  The  reverse  of  what  is  above  described  is  found  in  Ireland,  Turkey, 
and  Portugal,  so  long  the  close  allies  of  England — and  so  uniformly  fol- 
lowing in  the  course  of  policy  now  advocated  by  her  economists.  From 
each  and  all  of  them,  there  has  been  an  unceasing  drain  of  money — 
the  disappearance  of  the  precious  metals  having  been  followed  by  decline 
in  the  productiveness  of  agriculture — in  the  prices  of  commodities,  in  the 
value  of  land,  and  in  the  power  of  man. 

France  in  the  decade  prior  to  the  Eden  treaty  in  1786,  was  advancing 
in  both  manufactures  and  commerce  with  great  rapidity,  as  is  shown  con- 
clusively in  M.  de  Tocqueville's  recent  work.*  Raw  materials  and  the  pre- 

*  "  Simultaneous  with  these  changes  in  the  minds  of  governed  and  governors, 
public  prosperity  began  to  develop  with  unexampled  strides.  This  is  shown  by 
all  sorts  of  evidence.  Population  increased  rapidly  ;  wealth  more  rapidly  still. 
The  American  war  did  not  check  the  movement — it  completed  the  embarrass- 
ment of  the  State,  but  did  not  impede  private  enterprise ;  individuals  grew  more 
industrious,  more  inventive,  richer  than  ever. 

"An  official  of  the  time  states  that  in  1774  'industrial  progress  had  been  so 
rapid  that  the  amount  of  taxable  articles  had  largely  increased.'  On  comparing 
the  various  contracts  made  between  the  State  and  the  companies  to  which  the 

14 


Money. 

clous  metals  flowing  in,  and  manufactured  goods  flowing  out,  the  result 
was  seen  in  a  daily  increasing  tendency  towards  the  division  of  land,  the 
improvement  of  agriculture,  and  the  increase  of  human  freedom.  From 
the  date  of  that  treaty,  however,  all  was  changed.  Manufactures  flowed 
in,  and  gold  flowed  out,  with  daily  decline  in  the  power  of  association,  in 
the  wages  of  labor,  and  in  the  value  of  land.  Universal  distress  producing 
a  demand  for  change  of  policy,  its  effect  was  seen  in  the  calling  together 
of  the  States-General,  whose  appearance  on  the  stage  for  the  first  time  in 
a  hundred  and  eighty  years,  was  so  soon  to  be  followed  by  a  revolution, 
that  sent  to  the  guillotine  the  most  of  those  by  whom  that  treaty  had 
been  made. 

Looking  to  Spain,  we  see  her  poverty  to  have  steadily  increased  from 
the  hour,  when,  by  expelling  her  manufacturing  population,  she  rendered 
herself  dependent  upon  the  workshops  of  other  countries.  Mistress  of 
Mexico  and  Peru,  she  acted  merely  as  the  conduit  through  which  their 
wealth  passed  to  the  advancing  countries  of  the  world,  as  is  now  the  case 
with  Great  Britain  and  the  United  States. 

Turning  next  to  Mexico,  we  see  her  to  have  been  declining  steadily  in 
power  from  the  day  on  which  she  obtained  her  independence ;  and  for  the 
reason,  that  from  that  date  her  manufactures  began  to  disappear.  From 
year  to  year  she  becomes  more  and  more  dependent  upon  the  trader,  and 
more  and  more  compelled  to  export  her  commodities  in  their  rudest  state  ; 
as  a  necessary  consequence  of  which,  her  power  to  retain  the  produce  of 
her  mines  is  constantly  diminishing. 

11.  The  facts  thus  far  presented,  may  now  be  embodied  in  the  follow- 
ing propositions  : — 

Raw  materials  tend  towards  those  countries  in  which  employments  are 
most  diversified — in  which  the  power  of  association  most  exists — and  in 
which  land  and  labor  tend  most  to  rise  in  price. 

The  precious  metals  tend  towards  the  same  countries ;  and  for  the  rea- 
son, that  there  it  is  that  finished  commodities  are  least  in  price. 

The  greater  the  attractive  force  exerted  upon  those  raw  materials  and 
this  gold,  the  more  does  agriculture  tend  to  become  a  science — the  larger 
are  the  returns  to  agricultural  labor — the  more  steady  and  regular  becomes 
the  motion  of  society — the  more  rapid  is  the  development  of  the  powers 
of  the  land,  and  of  the  men  by  whom  it  is  occupied — the  larger  is  the 
commerce — and  the  greater  the  progress  towards  happiness,  wealth,  and 
power. 

Raw  materials  tend/rom  those  countries  in  which  employments  are  least 

taxes  were  farmed  out,  at  different  periods  during  the  reign  of  Louis  XVI.,  one 
perceives  that  the  yield  was  increasing  with  astonishing  rapidity.  The  lease  of 
1786  yielded  fourteen  millions  more  than  that  of  1780.  Necker,  in  his  report  of 
1781,  estimated  that '  the  produce  of  taxes  on  articles  of  consumption  increased 
at  the  rate  of  two  millions  a  year. 

"Arthur  Young  states  that  in  1788  the  commerce  of  Bordeaux  was  greater  than 
that  of  Liverpool,  and  adds  that  '  of  late  years  maritime  trade  has  made  more 
progress  in  France  than  in  England ;  the  whole  trade  of  France  has  doubled  in 
the  last  twenty  years.'  " — DE  TOCQUEVILLE,  The  Old  Regime  and  the  Revolution, 
p.  210. 

15 


Money. 

diversified — those  in  which  the  power  of  combination  least  exists — and 
those  consequently,  in  which  land  and  labor  are  least  in  price. 

The  precious  metals,  too,  tend  to  leave  those  countries,  because  there  it 
is  that  finished  commodities  are  dearest. 

The  greater  the  expulsive  force  that  is  thus  exhibited,  the  slower  is  the 
circulation  of  society,  and  the  smaller  is  the  amount  of  commerce — the 
more  rapid  is  the  exhaustion  of  the  soil — the  lower  is  the  condition  of 
agriculture — the  less  is  the  return  to  the  labors  of  the  field — the  lower 
are  the  prices  of  the  products  of  the  farm — the  less  is  the  regularity  of  the 
motion  of  society — the  greater  is  the  power  of  the  trader — and  the  stronger 
is  the  tendency  towards  pauperism  and  crime  among  the  people,  and  to- 
wards weakness  in  the  government. 

The  portions  of  the  world  from  which  the  precious  metals  flow,  in  which 
agriculture  declines,  and  men  become  less  free,  are  those  which  follow  in 
the  lead  of  England — preferring  the  supremacy  of  trade  to  the  extension 
of  commerce — Ireland,  Turkey,  Portugal,  India,  Carolina,  and  other  ex- 
clusively agricultural  countries. 

The  portions  towards  which  they  flow  are  those  which  follow  in  the  lead 
of  France — preferring  the  extension  of  commerce  to  the  enlargement  of 
the  trader's  power.  Germany  and  Denmark,  Sweden  and  New  England, 
are  in  this  position.  In  all  of  these  agriculture  becomes  more  and  more 
a  science,  as  employments  become  diversified — the  returns  to  agricultural 
labor  increasing  as  the  prices  of  raw  materials  tend  to  rise. 

In  all  the  countries  to  which  they  flow,  the  prices  of  raw  materials  and 
those  of  finished  commodities  tend  to  approximate — the  farmer  giving  a 
steadily  diminishing  quantity  -of  wool  and  corn  in  return  for  a  constant 
quantity  of  cloth  and  iron. 

In  those  from  which  they  flow,  those  prices  become  from  year  to  year 
more  widely  separated — the  farmer  and  the  planter  giving  a  steadily  in- 
creasing quantity  of  wool  and  corn  for  a  diminishing  quantity  of  iron,  or 
of  cloth. 

Such  are  the  facts  presented  by  the  history  of  the  outer  world,  of  both 
the  present  and  the  past.  How  far  they  are  in  accordance  with  our  own 
experience  we  may  now  inquire. 

12.  The  mining  communities  of  the  world  having  raw  products  to  sell, 
and  needing  to  purchase  finished  commodities,  the  gold  and  silver  they 
produce  flow  naturally  to  those  countries  that  have  such  commodities  to 
sell ',  and  not  towards  those  which  have  only  raw  materials  to  offer  in  ex- 
change. India  has  cotton  to  sell ;  Ireland  and  Turkey  have  grain  :  Brazil 
has  sugar  and  coffee ;  while  Alabama  has  only  cotton ;  for  which  reason 
it  is  that  money  is  always  scarce  in  those  countries,  and  the  rate  of  interest 
high.  Looking  homeward,  we  find  that  whenever  our  policy  has  tended 
towards  the  production  of  combination  of  action  between  the  farmer  and 
the  artisan,  we  have  been  importers  of  the  precious  metals,  and  that  then 
land  and  labor  have  risen  in  price.  The  contrary  effect  has  invariably  been 
produced,  whenever  our  policy  has  tended  to  the  diminution  of  association, 
and  the  production  of  a  necessity  for  looking  abroad  for  making  all  our 
exchanges  of  food  and  wool  for  cloth  and  iron — limited,  however,  for  the 
period  immediately  following  the  change,  by  the  existence  of  a  credit  that 

16 


Money, 

has  enabled  us  to  run  in  debt  to  Europe,  and  thus  for  a  time  to  arrest  the 
export  of  the  precious  metals.  What  was  the  precise  course  of  the  trade 
in  those  metals  during  the  thirty  years  preceding  the  discovery  of  the 
California  gold  deposits,  is  shown  by  the  following  figures  : — 

Excess  exports.  Excess  imports. 

1821—1825  $12,500,000 


1826—1829 
1830—1834 
1835—1838 
1839—1842 
1843—1847 
1848—1850 


9,000,000 

14,600,000 


$4,000,000 
20,000,000 
34,000,000 

39,000.000 


In  the  closing  years  of  the  free  trade  system  of  1817,  the  average 
excess  of  specie  export  was  about  $2,500,000  a  year.  To  this  adding  a 
similar  amount,  only,  for  the  annual  consumption,  we  obtain  an  absolute 
diminution  of  five-and-twenty  millions,  while  the  population  had  increased 
about  ten  per  cent.  Under  such  circumstances,  it  is  no  matter  of  surprise 
that  those  years  are  conspicuous  among  the  most  calamitous  ones  in  our 
history.  At  Pittsburg,  flour  then  sold  at  $1  25  per  barrel;  wheat,  through- 
out Ohio,  would  command  but  20  cents  a  bushel ;  while  a  ton  of  bar  iron 
required  little  short  of  eighty  barrels  of  flour  to  pay  for  it.  Such  was  the 
state  of  affairs  that  produced  the  tariff  of  1824 — a  very  imperfect  mea- 
sure of  protection,  but  one  that,  imperfect  as  it  was,  changed  the  course  of 
the  current,  and  caused  a  net  import,  in  the  four  years  that  followed,  of 
$4,000,000  of  the  precious  metals.  In  1828,  there  was  enacted  the  first 
tariff  tending  directly  to  the  promotion  of  association  throughout  the 
country ;  and  its  effects  exhibit  themselves  in  an  excess  import  of  the  pre- 
cious metals — averaging  $4,000,000  a  year — notwithstanding  the  discharge, 
in  that  period,  of  the  whole  of  the  national  debt  that  had  been  held  in 
Europe,  amounting  to  many  millions.  Putting  together  tne  discharge  of  debt 
and  the  import  of  coin,  the  balance  of  trade  in  that  period  must  have  been 
in  our  favor  to  the  extent  of  nearly  $50,000,000 ;  or  an  average  of  about 
$10,000,000  a  year.  As  a  consequence,  prosperity  existed  to  an  extent 
never  before  known — the  power  to  purchase  foreign  commodities  growing 
with  such  rapidity  as  to  render  it  necessary  greatly  to  enlarge  the  free  list; 
and  then  it  was  that  coffee,  tea,  and  many  other  raw  commodities,  were 
emancipated  from  the  payment  of  any  impost.  Thus  did  efficient  protec- 
tion lead  to  a  freedom  of  commerce,  abroad  and  at  home,  such  as  had  never 
before  existed. 

The  first  few  years  of  the  compromise  tariff  of  1833  profited  largely  by 
the  prosperity  caused  by  the  act  of  1828,  and  the  reductions  under  it  were 
then  so  small  that  its  operation  was  but  slightly  felt.  In  those  years,  too, 
there  was  contracted  a  considerable  foreign  debt — stopping  the  export  of 
specie,  and  producing  an  excess  import  averaging  more  than  $8,000,000  a 
year.  Prosperity  seemed  to  exist,  but  it  was  of  the  same  description  that 
has  marked  the  last  few  years,  during  which  the  value  of  all  property  has 
depended  entirely  upon  the  power  to  contract  debts  abroad — thus  placing 
the  nation  more  completely  under  the  control  of  its-  distant  creditors. 

17 


Money. 

In  the  succeeding  years,  the  compromise  became  more  fully  operative.* 
Furnaces  and  factories  were  closed,  with  constantly  increasing  necessity 
for  looking  abroad  for  the  performance  of  all  exchanges,  and  correspond- 
ing necessity  for  remitting  money  to  pay  the  balance  due  on  the  purchases 
of  previous  years.  Nevertheless,  the  annual  specie  export  averaged  little 
more  than  $2,000,000 ;  but  if  to  this  be  added  a  consumption  of  only 
$3,000,000  a  year,  we  have  a  reduction  of  $20,000,000;  the  consequences 
of  which  were  seen  in  almost  total  suspension  of  commerce.  The  whole 
country  was  in  a  state  of  ruin.  Laborers  were  everywhere  out  of  em- 
ployment, and  being  still  consumers,  while  producing  nothing,  the  power 
of  accumulation  ceased  almost  to  exist.  Debtors  being  everywhere  at  the 
mercy  of  creditors,  sales  of  real  estate  were  chiefly  accomplished  by  help 
of  sheriffs,  whose  employments  were  then  more  productive  than  they  had 
been  from  the  date  of  the  constitution. 

The  change  in  the  value  of  labor,  consequent  upon  the  stoppage  of  the 
circulation  that  followed  this  trivial  export  of  the  precious  metals,  cannot 
be  placed  at  less  than  $500,000,000  a  year.  Wages  were  low,  even  where 
employment  could  be  obtained ;  but  a  large  portion  of  the  labor-power  of 
the  country  was  totally  wasted,  and  the  demand  for  mental  power  dimi- 
nished even  more  rapidly  than  that  for  physical  exertion.  In  the  prices  of 
land,  houses,  machinery  of  all  kinds,  and  other  similar  property,  the  re- 
duction counted  by  thousands  of  millions  of  dollars;  and  yet,  the  difference 
between  the  two  periods  ending  in  1833  and  1842,  in  regard  to  the  mone- 
tary movement,  was  only  that  between  an  excess  import  of  $5,000,000, 
and  an  excess  export  of  $2,500,000,  or  a  total  of  $7,500,000  a  year.  No 
one  who  studies  these  facts,  can  fail  to  be  struck  with  the  wonderful  power 
over  the  fortunes  and  conditions  of  men  exerted  by  the  metals  provided 
by  the  Creator  for  furthering  the  work  of  association  among  mankind. 
With  the  small  excess  of  import  in  the  first  period,  there  was  a  steady 
tendency  towards  equality  of  condition  among  the  poor  and  the  rich,  the 
debtor  and  the  creditor ;  whereas,  with  the  slight  excess  of  export  in  the 
second  one,  there  was  a  daily  increasing  tendency  towards  inequality — the 
poor  laborer  and  the  debtor,  passing  steadily  more  under  the  control  of 
the  rich  employer,  and  the  wealthy  creditor.  Of  all  the  machinery  fur- 
nished for  the  use  of  man,  there  is  none  so  equalizing  in  its  tendency  as 
that  known  by  the  name  of  money;  and  yet  economists  would  have  the 
world  believe  that  th<e  agreeable  feeling  which  everywhere  attends  a  know- 
ledge that  it  is  flowing  in,  is  evidence  of  ignorance — any  reference  to 
the  question  of  the  favorable  or  unfavorable  balance  of  trade  being 
beneath  the  dignity  of  men  who  feel  that  they  are  following  in  the  foot- 
steps of  Hume  and  Smith.  It  would,  however,  be  as  difficult  to  find  a 
single  prosperous  country  that  is  not,  from  year  to  year,  making  itself  a 
better  customer  to  the  gold-producing  countries,  as  it  would  be  to  find  one 
that  is  not  becoming  a*  better  .customer  to  those  which  produce  silk,  or 

*  One-tenth  of  the  excess  over  20  per  cent,  was  reduced  in  December,  1833, 
another  tenth  in  1835,  a  third  iu  1837,  and  a  fourth  in  1839  ;  the  remaining  ex- 
cess of  duties  being  then  equally  divided  into  two  parts,  to  be  reduced  in  1841 
and  1842. 

18 


Money. 

cotton. _  To  an  improving  customer,  there  must  be  in  its  favor  a  steadily 
increasing  balance  of  trade,  to  be  settled  by  payment  in  the  commodity 
for  whose  production  the  country  is  fitted,  whether  that  be  cloth,  or  to- 
bacco, silver  or  gold. 

The  condition  of  the  nation  at  the  date  of  the  passage  of  the  act  of  1842, 
was  humiliating  in  the  extreme.  The  treasury — unable  to  obtain  at  home 
the  means  required  for  administering  the  government,  even  on  the  most 
economical  scale — -had  failed  in  all  its  efforts  to  negotiate  a  loan  at  six  per 
cent.,  even  in  the  same  foreign  markets  in  which  it  had  but  recently  paid 
off,  at  par,  a  debt  bearing  an  interest  of  only  three  per  cent.  Many  of 
the  States,  and  some  even  of  the  oldest  of  them,  had  been  forced  to  sus- 
pend the  payment  of  interest  on  their  debts.  The  banks,  to  a  great  extent, 
were  in  a  state  of  suspension,  and  those  which  professed  to  redeem  their 
notes,  found  their  business  greatly  restricted  by  the  increasing  demand 
for  coin  to  go  abroad.  The  use  of  either  gold  or  silver  as  currency  had 
almost  altogether  ceased.  The  Federal  government,  but  recently  so  rich, 
was  driven  to  the  use  of  inconvertible  paper  money,  in  all  its  transactions 
with  the  people.  Of  the  merchants,  a  large  portion  had  become  bankrupt. 
Factories  and  furnaces  being  closed,  hundreds  of  thousands  of  persons  were 
totally  unemployed.  Commerce  had  scarcely  an  existence — those  who 
could  not  sell  their  own  labor,  being  unable  to  purchase  of  others.  Never- 
theless, deep  as  was  the  abyss  into  which  the  nation  had  been  plunged,  so 
magical  was  the  effect  of  the  adoption  of  a  system  that  had  turned  the 
balance  of  trade  in  its  favor,  that  scarcely  had  the  act  of  August,  1842, 
become  a  law,  when  the  government  found  that  it  could  have  all  its  wants 
supplied  at  home.  Mills,  factories,  and  furnaces,  long  closed,  were  again 
opened;  labor  came  again  into  demand;  and,  before  the  close  of  its  third 
year,  prosperity  almost  universally  reigned.  States  recommenced  the  pay- 
ment of  interest  on  their  debts.  Railroads  and  canals  again  paid  dividends. 
Real  estate  had  doubled  in  value,  and  mortgages  had  been  everywhere 
lightened ;  and  yet  the  total  net  import  of  specie  in  the  first  four  of  the 
years,  was  but  $17,000,000,  or  $4,250,000  per  annum  !  In  the  last  year 
occurred  the  Irish  famine,  creating  a  great  demand  for  food ;  the  conse- 
quence of  which  was,  an  import  of  no  less  than  $22,000,000  of  gold — 
making  a  total  import,  in  five  years,  of  $39,000,000.  Deducting  from 
this  but  $4,000,000  per  annum  for  consumption,  it  leaves  an  annual  in- 
crease, for  the  purposes  of  circulation,  of  less  than  $5,000,000 ;  and  yet 
the  difference  in  the  prices  of  labor  and  land  in  1847,  as  compared  with 
1842,  would  be  lowly  estimated,  if  placed  at  only  $2,000,000,000. 

With  1847,  however,  there  came  another  change  of  policy — the  nation 
being  again  called  upon  to  try  the  system  under  which  it  had  been  pros- 
trated in  1840-'42.  The  doctrines  of  -Hume  and  Smith,  in  reference  to 
the  balance  of  trade,  were  again  adopted  as  those  by  which  a  government 
was  to  be  directed  in  its  movements.  Protection  being  then  repudiated, 
the  consequences  were  speedily  seen  in  the  fact,  that  within  three  years, 
factories  and  furnaces  were  again  closed,  labor  was  seeking  demand,  and 
gold  was  flowing  out  even  more  rapidly  than  it  had  come  in  under  the 
tariff  of  1842.  The  excess  export  of  those  three  years  amounted  to 
$14,000,000 ;  and  if  to  this  be  added  $15,000,000  for  consumption,  it 

19 


Money. 

follows  that  the  reduction  was  equal  to  the  total  increase  under  the  previ- 
ous system.  Circulation  was  everywhere  being  suspended,  and  a  crisis 
was  close  at  hand,  when,  fortunately  for  the  advocates  of  the  existing  sys- 
tem, the  gold  deposits  of  California  were  brought  to  light. 

In  the  year  1850— '51,  the  quantity  received  from  that  source  was  more 
than  $40,000,000,  of  which  nearly  $20,000,000  were  retained  at  home. 
The  consequence  was  speedily  seen  in  a  reduction  of  the  rate  of  interest, 
and  a  re-establishment  of  commerce.  In  the  following  year,  $37,000,000 
were  exported,  leaving,  perhaps,  $8,000,000  or  $10,000,000,  which,  added 
to  that  retained  in  1851,  made  an  addition  to  the  currency  of  probably 
$30,000,000 — producing  universal  life  and  motion.  In  1852-'53,  there 
was  still  a  slight  increase,  but  in  the  two  years  following,  the  export  was 
$97,000,000 ;  and  if  to  this  we  add  a  domestic  consumption  that  probably 
was  but  little  short  of  $20,000,000,  we  obtain  a  total  amount  withdrawn 
exceeding  the  receipt  from  all  the  world.  Looking  now  to  the  Union  east 
of  the  Rocky  Mountains,  it  may  well  be  doubted  if  the  effective  addition  to 
the  stock  of  the  precious  metals  remaining  in  the  form  of  coin  much  exceeds 
a  single  dollar  per  head  of  the  population.*  It  may  amount  to  $30,000,000 
or  $35,000,000 ;  and  small  as  is  that  sum,  it  would  have  produced  a  great 
effect  in  promoting  rapidity  of  circulation,  had  it  not  been  that,  simulta- 
neously therewith,  the  indebtedness  to  foreign  countries  had  so  much  in- 
creased, as  to  require,  for  the  payment  of  interest  alone,,  an  annual  remit- 
tance equal  to  the  whole  export  of  food  to  all  the  world — producing  doubt 
and  general  distrust — causing  an  extensive  hoarding  of  money,  and  palsying 
the  movements  of  commerce.  As  a  consequence  of  this  it  is,  that  the  coun- 
try now  presents  the  most  extraordinary  spectacle  in  the  world — that  of  a 
community  owning  one  of  the  great  sources  of  supply  for  money,  in  which 
the  price  paid  for  its  use  is  generally  thrice,  and,  in  many  parts  of  the 
country,  six  or  eight  times  as  great  as  in  those  countries  of  Europe  which 
find  their  gold  mines  in  their  furnaces,  their  rolling-mills,  and  their  cotton 
and  woollen  factories. 

*  In  the  last  Treasury  Report  (1856)  the  addition  to  the  stock  of  the  precious 
metals  in  the  last  few  years  is  estimated  at  more  than  $100,000,000,  and  possibly 
even  $150,000,000.  Small  allowance  is  there,  however,  made  for  a  consumption  in 
the  arts,  that  must,  in  the  last  five  years,  have  absorbed  at  least  fifty  of  those  mil- 
lions. None  is  made  for  the  fact  that  $20,000,000  are  always  kept  in  the  Treasury 
vaults,  and,  while  there,  are  as  useless  as  would  be  a  similar  weight  of  pebble- 
stones. Much  advantage  is  claimed  to  have  resulted  from  increasing  the  diflU 
culty  of  transferring  the  property  in  money,  by  compelling  individuals  to  carry 
gold  in  their  pockets,  when,  if  the  law  permitted,  they  would  prefer  to  carry 
bank-notes.  No  allowance  is  made  for  a  land  system  that  compels  millions  of 
dollars  in  gold  to  be  transported  from  one  part  of  the  country  to  another,  at  great 
cost  and  risk,  when  drafts  would  be  used,  were  it  not  that  it  is  the  object  of  the 
Federal  government,  as  far  as  possible,  to  destroy  the  utility  of  the  precious 
metals,  by  promoting  their  transportation,  and  thus  preventing  their  circulation. 
From  the  day  when  free  trade  was  inaugurated  as  the  policy  of  the  dominant 
party  of  the  country,  there  has  been  almost  an  unceasing  war  against  credit ; 
and  the  result  is  seen  in  the  fact  that  it  requires  $200,000,000  of  gold  and  silver 
to  carry  on  a  smaller  amount  of  commerce  than  would,  under  a  sound  system, 
be  transacted  by  help  of  less  than  $100,000,000,  and  with  a  steadiness  and  regu- 
larity that  now  are  quite  unknown. 

20 


Money. 

Our  policy  has,  with  slight  exceptions,  looked  steadily  towards  keeping 
down  the  prices  of  the  rude  products  of  the  earth,  and  thus  facilitating 
their  export;  and  the  precious  metals  always  follow  in  their  train.  The 
result  is  seen  in  the  general  exhaustion  of  the  soil — in  the  fact  that  agri- 
culture makes  but  little  progress — in  the  diminished  yield  of  the  land,  and 
in  the  steady  decline  of  the  price  of  tobacco,  flour,  cotton  and  other  rude 
products  of  the  earth.  Taking  the  averages  of  the  several  decades  since 
1810,  the  export  prices  of  flour  have  been  as  follows  : — 

For  that  ending  in  1820        ....  $10  37 

"             "          1830 6  20 

"             "          1840 6  78 

0             "           1850 5  27 

The  3  years  ending  1853 4  67 

For  1853 4  24 

— this  last  being  probably  the  lowest  price  at  which  it  has  been  sold  since 
the  arrival  of  Hendrick  Hudson  in  your  harbor.  The  prices  above  given, 
I  pray  you  to  recollect,  are  those  furnished  in  the  recent  Treasury  Reports. 
Precisely  similar  to  this  have  been  the  facts  transpiring  in  relation  to  cot- 
ton and  tobacco ;  of  the  former  of  which,  the  planter  was  giving,  in  1852, 
little  short  of  five  pounds  for  the  same  quantity  of  gold  and  silver  that 
seven-and-thirty  years  before  he  obtained  for  one. 

The  power  to  command  the  services  of  the  precious  metals  grows  with 
the  growth  o.f  the  power  of  association  and  combination.  The  policy  of 
the  Union  is  hostile  to  association,  and  hence  it  is  that  our  products  fall 
in  price,  while  all  the  metals  remain  so  dear.  That  is  the  course  towards 
barbarism.  You  will  probably  be  disposed  to  say,  that  prices  are  now  very 
high,  and  that  if  such  prices  are  to  insure  prosperity,  it  is  certainly  within 
our  reach.  Such  would  be  the  case,  were  it  not  for  the  causes  to  which 
they  are  due — great  deficiency  in  the  quantity  produced.  Twenty  years 
since,  we  had  similar  prices,  and  for  the  same  reason — all  the  energies  of 
the  country  having  then  been  given,  as  is  now  the  case,  to  the  creation  of 
food  and  cotton-producing  machinery,  and  not  to  the  production  of  either 
food  or  cotton.  Those  high  prices  were,  however,  only  the  precursors  of 
the  ruinously  low  ones  of  1841  and  '42. 

The  quantity  of  food  now  produced  is  far  less,  per  head,  than  it  was  four 
years  since  ;  while  the  average  crop  of  cotton,  for  the  last  four  years,  has 
been  less  than  that  of  1851-'52.  Desiring  to  know  the  cause,  you  need 
only  to  look  to  the  facts,  that  the  rural  population  of  your  own  State  is 
gradually  diminishing;  and  that  the  young  Ohio  has  now  become  the  great 
emigrating  State  of  the  Union.  The  men  who  are  now  being  driven  from 
farms  in  the  East,  to  found  colonies  in  the  West,  are  consumers,  and  not 
producers ;  but  the  day  approaches,  when  the  effects  of  their  labor  will 
become  visible  in  such  a  reduction  of  prices  as  has  never  before  been  known. 
Any  one  who,  in  1835,  had  predicted  the  universal  ruin  of  farms,  that  fol- 
lowed three  years  later,  would  have  been  listened  to  with  an  incredulity 
equal  to  that  which  you,  probably,  hear  one  say  that  the  occurrences  of 
184l-'42  are  yet  to  be  repeated.  In  the  last  ten  years,  we  have  added 
to  our  numbers  almost  as  many  millions ;  and  yet  we  have  scarcely  more 
persons  engaged  in  the  four  chief  branches  of  manufacturing  than  we 

21 


Money. 

had  in  1847-'48.  Nearly  the  whole  increase  has  heen  driven  to  the  crea- 
tion of  farms  and  plantations,  that  will  yet  overwhelm  the  market  with 
food  and  cotton.  The  whole  policy  of  the  country  is  adverse  to  the  agri- 
cultural interest,  for  it  tends  toward  cheapening  raw  products,  and  thus 
promoting  the  exports  of  the  precious  metals. 

13.  "In  every  kingdom  into  which  money  hegins  to  flow  in  greater 
abundance  than  formerly,  everything,"  says  Mr.  Hume,  in  his  well-known 
Essay  on  Money,  "  takes  a  new  face :  labor  and  industry  gain  life ;  the 
merchant  becomes  more  enterprising,  the  manufacturer  more  diligent  and 
skilful ;  and  even  the  farmer  follows  his  plough  with  more  alacrity  and 
attention." 

That  this  is  so,  is  well  known  to  all.  Why  should  it  be  so  ?  Because 
the  circulation  of  society  then  increases,  and  all  power — whether  in  the 
physical  or  social  world — results  from  motion.  When  money  is  flowing 
in,  every  man  is  enabled  to  find  a  purchaser  for  his  labor,  and  to  become 
a  purchaser  of  that  of  others.  Therefore  it  is,  that  commerce  so  steadily 
increases  in  those  countries  in  which  the  Californian  and  Australian  pro- 
ducts now  so  rapidly  accumulate — France,  G-ermany,  and  Northern  and 
Eastern  Europe  generally.  When,  on  the  contrary,  money  flows  out,  the 
circulation  diminishes,  and  labor  is  everywhere  wasted.  That  labor-power 
is  capital,  the  result  of  the  consumption  of  other  capital  in  the  form  of* 
food;  and  all  the  difference  between  an'  advancing  and  a  declining  state 
of  society,  is  found  in  the  fact,  that  in  the  one,  there  is  a  constant  increase 
in  the  rapidity  with  which  the  demand  for  muscular  or  mental  power  fol- 
lows its  production,  while  in  the  other,  there  is  a  daily  diminution  therein. 
The  more  instantly  the  demand  follows  the  supply,  the  more  is  the  force 
economized,  and  the  larger  is  the  power  of  accumulation.  The  longer  the 
interval  between  production  and  consumption,  the  greater  is  the  waste  of 
force,  and  the  less  is  the  power  of  accumulation. 

Of  all  the  machinery  in  use  among  men,  there  is  none  that  exercises 
upon  their  actions  so  great  an  influence  as  that  which  gathers  up  and 
divides  and  subdivides,  and  then  gathers  up  again,  to  be  on  the  instant 
divided  and  subdivided  again,  the  minutes  and  quarter-hours  of  a  commu- 
nity. It  is  the  machinery  of  association,  and  the  indispensable  machinery 
of  progress;  and  therefore  it  is,  that  we  see  in  all  new  or  poor  communi- 
ties so  constant  an  effort  to  obtain  something  to  be  used  in  place  of  it;  as 
is  shown  in  various  countries  in  which  an  irredeemable  paper  constitutes 
the  only  medium  of  exchange.  Throughout  the  West,  a  currency  of  some 
description  is  felt  to  be  among  the  prime  necessities  of  life.  So  well  is 
this  want  understood,  that  many  Eastern  banks  supply  notes  expressly  for 
Western  circulation,  and  the  people  there  pass  them  from  hand  to  hand, 
because  any  money  is  better  than  none,  and  good  they  cannot  get,  for  the 
reason  that  metallic  money  always  flows  from  the  place  where  the  charge 
for  its  use  is  high,  to  that  at  which  it  is  low.  The  rate  of  interest  in  the 
West  is  now  enormous,  but  every  day  witnesses  the  export  of  gold  to  the 
East,  where  it  is  somewhat  less;  and  yet  even  your  high  interest — rang- 
ing, as  it  has  done  for  years,  between  ten  and  thirty  per  cent,  per  annum 
— cannot  prevent  it  from  going  to  France  and  Germany,  where  it  com- 
mands but  five  or  six  per  cent.  Money  thus  obeys  the  same  law  as  water 

22 


Money. 

— seeking  always  the  lowest  level.  The  latter  falls  upon,  the  hills,  but  from 
the  moment  of  its  fall  it  never  stops  until  it  reaches  the  ocean ;  nor  does 
the  gold  of  California,  or  the  silver  of  Mexico,  stop  until  it  reaches  that 
point  at  which  money  most  abounds,  and  at  which,  for  that'  reason,  ,the 
price  paid  for  its  use  is  least. 

Of  all  the  commodities  in  use  by  man,  the  precious  metals  are  those 
that  render  the  largest  amount  of  service  in  proportion  to  their  cost — and 
those  whose  movements  furnish  the  most  perfect  test  of  the  soundness  or 
unsoundness  of  its  commercial  system.  They  go  from  those  countries 
whose  people  are  engaged  in  exhausting  the  soil,  to  those  in  which  they 
renovate  and  improve  it.  They  go  from  those  at  which  the  price  of  raw 
products,  and  the  land  itself,  is  low — -from  those  at  which  money  is  scarce 
and  interest  is  high.  The  country  that  desires  to  attract  the  precious 
metals,  and  to  lower  the  charge  for  the  use  of  money,  has,  then,  only  to 
adopt  the  measures  required  for  raising  the  price  of  land  and  labor.  In 
all  countries,  the  value  of  land  grows  with  that  development  of  the  human 
faculties  which  results  from  diversity  in  the  modes  of  employment,  and 
from  the  growth  of  the  power  of  combination.  That  power  grows  in 
France,  and  in  all  the  countries  of  Northern  Europe ;  and  for  the  reason, 
as  has  been  shown,  that  all  those  countries  have  adopted  the  course  of 
policy  recommended  by  Colbert,  and  carried  out  by  France.  It  declines 
in  Great  Britain,  in  Ireland,  in  Portugal,  in  Turkey,  in  the  Eastern  and 
Western  Indies,  and  in  all  countries  that  follow  the  teachings  of  the  Brit- 
ish school.  It  has  grown  among  ourselves  in  every  period  of  protection  ; 
and  then  money  has  flowed  in,  and  land  and  labor  have  risen  in  value.  It 
has  diminished  in  every  period  in  which  trade  has  obtained  the  mastery 
over  commerce.  Land  and  labor  have  always  declined  in  value  as  soon 
as  our  people  had  eaten,  drunk,  and  worn  foreign  merchandise  to  the  ex- 
tent of  hundreds  of  millions  of  dollars,  for  which  they  had  not  paid;  and 
had  thus  destroyed  their  credit  with  other  communities  of  the  world. 

14.  We  are  told,  however,  by  the  same  writer — Mr.  Hume — and  in  that 
he  is  followed  by  the  modern  economists — that  the  only  effect  of  an  in- 
crease of  the  supply  of  gold  and  silver  is  that  of  "  heightening  the  price 
of  commodities,  and  obliging  every  one  to  pay  more  of  those  little  yellow 
or  white  pieces  for  everything  he  purchases."  Were  such  really  the  case, 
it  would  be  little  short  of  a  miracle  that  we  should  see  money  always, 
century  after  century,  passing  in  the  same  direction — to  the  countries  that 
are  rich  from  those  that  are  poor ;  so  poor,  too,  that  they  cannot  afford  to 
keep  as  much  of  it  as  is  absolutely  necessary  for  their  own  exchanges. 
The  gold,  of  Siberia  leaves  a  land  in  which  so  little  circulates  that  labor 
and  its  products  are  at  the  lowest  prices,  to  find  its  way  to  St.  Petersburg, 
where  it  will  purchase  less  labor  and  less  of  either  wheat  or  hemp  than  it 
would  do  at  home ;  and  that  of  Carolina  and  Virginia  goes  steadily  and 
regularly,  year  after  year,  to  the  countries  to  which  the  people  of  those 
States  send  their  cotton  and  their  wheat,  because  of  the  higher  prices  at 
which  they  sell.  The  silver  of  Mexico,  and  its  cochineal,  travel  together 
to  the  same  market ;  and  the  gold  of  Australia  passes  to  Britain  by  the 
ship  which  carries  the  wool  yielded  by  its  flocks. 

Every  addition  to  the  stock  of  money,  as  we  are  assured  by  the  inge- 

23   " 


Money. 

nious  men  of  modern  days  engaged  in  compiling  treasury  tables  and 
finance  reports,  renders  a  country  a  good  place  to  sell  in,  but  a  bad  one 
in  which  to  purchase.  To  what  countries,  however,  is  it  that  men  have 
most  resorted  when  they  desired  to  purchase  ?  Have  they  not,  until  re- 
cently, gone,  almost  exclusively,  to  Britain  ?  It  has  been  so,  assuredly ; 
and  for  the  reason,  that  there  it  has  been  that  finished  commodities  were 
cheaply  furnished.  Where  have  they  gone  to  sell  ?  Has  it  not  been  to 
Britain  ?  It  certainly  has  been  so ;  and  for  the  reason,  that  there  it  was 
that  gold,  cotton,  wheat,  and  all  other  of  the  rude  products  of  the  earth, 
were  dear.  Where  do  they  now  most  tend  to  go  when  they  desire  to 
purchase  cloths  or  silks  ?  Is  it  not  to  France  and  Germany  ?  So  it  cer- 
tainly is ;  and  for  the  reason,  that  there  it  is  that  raw  materials  are  high- 
est, and  finished  ones  are  cheapest.  Gold  follows  in  the  train  of  raw  ma- 
terials generally — these  last  being  found,  invariably,  travelling  to  those  places 
at  which  the  rude  products  of  the  earth  command  the  highest  price,  while 
cloth,  iron,  and  manufactures  of  iron  and  other  metals,  may  be  purchased 
at  the  lowest ;  and  the  greater  the  flow  in  that  direction,  the  greater  is 
the  tendency  to  further  enhancing  the  prices  of  the  former,  and  reducing 
those  of  the  latter.  From  this  it  would  seem  that  increase  in  the  supply 
and  circulation  of  money,  so  far  from  having  the  effect  of  causing  men 
to  give  two  pieces  for  an  article  that  could  before  have  been  had  for  one, 
has,  on  the  contrary,  that  of  enabling  them  to  obtain  for  one  piece  the 
commodity  that  before  had  cost  them  two  ;  and  that  such  is  the  fact,  can 
readily  be  shown. 

It  is  within  the  knowledge  of  all,  that  manufactures  have  greatly  fallen 
in  price — the  quantity  of  cotton  cloth  that  can  now  be  obtained  for  a  sin- 
gle dollar  being  as  great  as  would  formerly  have  cost  five — and  that  the 
reduction  has  taken  place  in  the  very  countries  into  which  the  gold  of  the 
world  has  steadily  flowed,  and  into  which  it  is  now  flowing — whence  it 
would  appear  quite  certain  that  finished  commodities  tend  to  fall  as  money 
flows  in,  while  land  and  labor — the  ultimate  raw  materials  of  all — tend  to 
rise  in  price.  The  gold  of  California  and  Australia  now  goes  to  Germany, 
France,  Belgium,  and  Great  Britain,  where  money  abounds  and  interest 
is  low,  because  there  manufactured  commodities  are  cheap  and  money  is 
valuable,  when  measured  by  them.  It  does  not  go  to  Spain,  Italy,  Portu- 
gal, or  Turkey,  because  there  manufactured  goods  are  dear,  and  land  and 
labor  are  cheap.  It  does  not  stop  in  Mississippi,  Arkansas,  or  Texas,  be- 
cause there,  too,  manufactures  are  dear,  and  land  and  labor  are  cheap ; 
but  there  it  will  stop  at  some  future  period,  when  it  shall  have  been  ascer- 
tained that  the  plough  and  the  harrow  should  always  have  for  their  near 
neighbors  the  spindle  and  the  loom. 

The  higher  products  of  a  skilful  agriculture — fruits,  garden  vegetables, 
and  flowers — tend  steadily  to  decline  in  price  in  all  those  countries  into 
which  money  is  flowing ;  and  for  the  reason,  that  agricultural  improve- 
ment always  accompanies  manufactures,  and  manufactures  always  attract 
the  precious  metals.  Every  one  familiar  with  the  operations  of  the  West, 
knows  that  while  corn  and  pork  are  there  always  cheap,  cabbages,  peas, 
beans,  and  all  green  crops,  are  invariably  scarce  and  dear;  and  so  continue, 
until,  as  around  Cincinnati  and  Pittsburg,  population  and  wealth  have 

24 


Money. 

given  a  stimulus  to  the  work  of  cultivation.  In  England,  the  increase  of 
green  crops  of  all  kinds  has  been  immense,  attended  with  the  decline  in 
price ;  and  in  France,  a  recent  writer*  informs  us  that,  notwithstanding 
the  increase  in  the  quantity  of  money,  the  price  of  wine  is  scarcely  more 
than  a  fourth  of  what  it  was  three  centuries  since.  By  another  we  are 
told,  that  "  every  man  in  France,  of  forty  years  of  age,  must  have  re- 
marked the  sensible  diminution  of  the  price  of  garden  produce,  fruits  of 
'all  kinds,  flowers,  etc. ;  and  that  most  of  the  oleaginous  grains  and  plants 
used  in  manufactures  have  fallen  in  like  manner;  while  beets,  carrots, 
beans,  etc.,  have  become  so  common  that  they  are  now  fed  to  animals  in 
the  stable."f 

Food  thus  becomes  more  abundant  in  those  countries  into  which  gold 
is  steadily  flowing,  and  it  becomes  less  so  in  those  from  which  the  gold 
flows,  as  is  seen  in  Carolina,  which  has  steadily  exhausted  her  land — in 
Turkey — in  Portugal — and  in  India.  In  all  those  countries,  land  and  la- 
bor are  low  in  price.  Give  them  manufactures — thus  enabling  their  peo- 
ple to  combine  their  efforts — and  they  will  obtain  and  retain  gold ;  and 
then  they  will  make  roads,  and  the  supplies  of  food  will  steadily  increase 
as  cloth  and  iron  become  cheaper ;  and  land  and  labor  will  then  rise  in 
price. 

15.  Of  what  use,  however,  it  may  be  asked,  are  further  supplies  of  gold 
and  silver  when  a  country  has  obtained  the  full  allowance  required  for  the 
most  perfect  circulation  of  its  products,  and  of  the  services  of  the  persons 
of  whom  the  society  is  composed  ?  Is  it  not  possible  that  the  commodity 
may  become  superabundant  ?  It  is  not ;  and  for  the  reason,  that  the  uses 
of  those  metals  are  so  numerous  and  great.  Silver  is  better  than  iron  for 
a  great  variety  of  purposes.  The  melting-pot  of  the  goldsmith,  or  the 
subjection  to  the  hammer  of  the  gold-beater,  is  the  ultimate  destination 
of  the  whole  of  the  vast  products  of  Siberia,  California,  and  Australia ; 
and  the  greater  the  power  to  use  them  in  the  arts,  the  more  rapid  must 
be  the  progress  of  civilization.  That  power  grows  with  increase  in  the 
facility  of  combination,  and  the  latter  grows  with  the  increased  facility  of 
obtaining  this  essential  machinery  of  association.  The  miner  of  gold  is 
thus  always  making  a  market  for  his  commodity,  and  the  more  of  it  that 
he  supplies,  the  greater  is  the  tendency  towards  decline  in  the  price  of  the 
cloth,  the  watches,  the  steam-engines,  and  the  books  that  he  seeks  to  pur- 
chase. In  proof  that  such  is  the  case,  it  is  needed  only  that — looking 
back  for  half  a  century — we  remark  the  vast  increase  in  the  demand  for 
plate,  and  the  growing  substitution  of  gold  for  the  silver  that  so  recently 
was  used.  Forty  years  since,  gold  watches  were  the  exception.  Now,  a 
silver  watch  is  rarely  seen.  Thirty  years  since,  a  gold  pencil-case  was 
quite  -a  rarity.  Now,  such  cases  are  made  almost  by  millions.  A  quar- 
ter of  a  century  since,  a  gilt-edged  book  was  an  unusual  article  of  luxury. 
Now,  gold  is  required  almost  by  tons  for  gilding  the  edges  of  books.  So 
is  it  everywhere — gold  and  silver  coming  daily  into  use,  because  of  the 
increased  facility  with  which  they  may  be  obtained ;  while  all  the  com- 

*  M.  Moreau  de  Jonnes. 
t  De  Fontenay,  Du  Revenu  Foncier. 
25 


Money. 

modities  required  for  the  miner's  purposes  have  steadily  declined  in  price. 
That  " all  djscord"  is  "  harmony  not  understood,"  we  are  assured;  and 
the  more  we  study  the  laws  of  nature,  the  more  conclusive  become  the 
proofs  that  such  is  certainly  the  case. 

16.  The  use  of  bank-notes  tends,  however,  as  we  are  assured,  to  pro- 
mote the  expulsion  of  gold.  Were  it  to  do  so,  it  would  be  in  opposition 
to  the  great  general  law  in  virtue  of  which  all  commodities  tend  to,  and 
not  from,  the  places  at  which  they  have  the  highest  utility.  A  bank  is  a 
machine  for  utilizing  monBy,  by  enabling  A,  B,  and  G  to  obtain  the  use 
of  it  at  the  time  when  D,  E,  and  F,  its  owners,  do  not  need  its  services. 
The  direct  effect  of  the  establishment  of  such  institutions  in  the  cities  of 
Europe  has  always  been  to  cause  money  to  flow  towards  those  cities ;  and 
for  the  reason,  that  there  its  utility  stood  at  the  highest  point.  Even  then, 
however,  there  were  difficulties  attendant  upon  the  change  of  property  in 
the  money  deposited  with  the  bank — the  owner  being  required  to  go  to 
the  banking-house,  and  write  it  off  to  other  parties.  To  obviate  this  diffi- 
culty, and  thus  increase  the  utility  of  money,  its  owners  were  at  length 
authorized  to  draw  checks,  by  means  of  which  they  were  enabled  to  trans- 
fer their  property  without  stirring  from  their  houses. 

The  difficulty  still,  however,  existed,  that — private  individuals  not  being 
generally  known — such  checks  could,  in  general,  effect  but  a  single  trans- 
fer, and  thus  the  recipient  of  money  found  himself  obliged  to  go  through 
the  operation  of  taking  possession  of  that  which  had  been  transferred  to 
him,  after  which  he  had,  in  his  turn,  to  draw  a  check  when  he  himself  de- 
sired to  effect  another  change  of  property.  To  obviate  this,  circulating 
notes  were  invented,  and  by  their  help  the  ownership  of  money  is  now 
transferred  with  such  rapidity  that  a  single  hundred  dollars  passes  from 
hand  to  hand  fifty  times  a  day — effecting  exchanges,  perhaps,  to  the  ex- 
tent of  many  thousand  dollars,  and  without  the  parties  being  at  any  time 
required  to  devote  a  single  instant  to  the  work  of  counting  the  coin.  This 
was  a  great  invention,  and  by  its  aid,  the  utility  of  money  was  so  much 
increased  that  a  single  thousand  pieces  could  be  made  to  do  more  work 
than  without  it  could  be  done  by  hundreds  of  thousands. 

This,  of  course,  as  we  are  told,  supersedes  gold  and  silver,  and  causes 
them  to  be  exported.  So  we  are  certainly  assured  by  those  economists 
who  regard  man  as  an  animal  that  must  be  fed  and  will  procreate ;  and  that 
can  be  made  to  work  only  under  the  pressure  of  a  strong  necessity.  Were 
they,  however,  to  look,  for  once,  at  the  real  MAN — the  being  made  in  the 
image  of  his  Creator,  and  capable  of  almost  infinite  elevation — they  would 
perhaps,  arrive  at  a  conclusion  widely  different.  The  desires  of  that  man 
are  infinite,  and  the  more  they  are  gratified,  the  more  rapidly  do  they  in- 
crease in  number.  The  miserable  Hottentot  dispenses  with  a  road  of  any 
kind,  but  the  enlightened  and  intelligent  people  of  other  countries  are  seen 
passing  in  succession  from  the  ordinary  village  road  to  the  turnpike,  and 
thence  to  the  railroad ;  and  the  better  the  existing  communications,  the 
greater  is  the  thirst  for  further  improvement.  The  better  the  schools  and 
houses,  the  greater  is  the  desire  for  superior  teachers  and  further  additions 
to  the  comforts  of  the  dwelling.  The  more  perfect  the  circulation  of 
society,  the  larger  is  the  reward  of  labor,  and  the  greater  is  the  power  to 

26 


Money. 

purchase  gold  and  silver,  to  be  used  for  the  various  purposes  for  which  they 
are  so  admirably  fitted,  and  the  greater  is  the  tendency  to  have  them  flow 
to  the  places  at  which  the  circulation  is  established.  Money  promotes  the 
circulation  of  society.  The  check  and  the  bank-note  stimulate  that  circu- 
lation— giving  thereby  value  to  labor  and  land  ;  and  wherever  these  checks 
and  notes  are  most  in  use,  there  should  the  inward  current  of  the  precious 
metals  be  most  fully  and  firmly  established. 

That  such  is  the  case,  is  proved  by  the  facts,  that,  for  a  century  past, 
the  precious  metals  have  tended  most  to  Britain,  where  such  notes  were 
most  in  use.  Their  use  increases  rapidly  in  France,  with  constant  increase 
in  the  inward  flow  of  gold.  So,  too,  does  it  in  Germany,  towards  which 
the  auriferous  current  now  sets  so  steadily  that  notes  which  are  the  repre- 
sentatives of  money  are  rapidly  taking  the  place  of  those  irredeemable  pieces 
of  paper  by  which  the  use  of  coin  has  so  long  been  superseded. 

Whence  flows  all  this  gold  ?  From  the  countries  in  which  employments 
are  not  diversified  j  from  those  in  which  there  is  little  power  of  association 
and  combination  ;  from  those  in  which,  therefore,  credit  has  no  existence  ; 
from  those,  finally,  which  do  not  use  that  'machinery  which  so  much  in- 
creases the  utility  of  the  precious  metals,  and  which  we  are  accustomed  to 
designate  by  the  term  bank  note.  The  precious  metals  go  from  California 
— from  Mexico — from  Peru — from  Brazil — from  Turkey — and  from 
Portugal — the  lands  in  which  property  in  money  is  transferred  only  by 
means  of  actual  delivery  of  the  coin  itself — to  those  in  which  it  is  trans- 
ferred by  means  of  a  check  or  note.  It  goes  from  the  plains  of  Kansas, 
where  notes  are  not  in  use,  to  New  York  and  New  England,  where  they 
are — from  Siberia  to  St.  Petersburg — -from  the  banks  of  African  rivers  to 
London  and  Liverpool — and  from  the  "diggings"  of  Australia  to  the 
towns  and  cities  of  Germany,  where  wool  is  dear  and  cloth  is  cheap. 

17.  All  the  facts  exhibited  throughout  the  world  tend  to  prove  that 
every  commodity  seeks  that  place  at  which  it  has  the  highest  utility ;  and 
all  those  connected  with  the  movement  of  the  precious  metals  prove  that 
they  constitute  no  exception  to  the  rule.  Bank-notes  increase  the  utility 
of  those  metals,  and  should,  therefore,  attract,  and  not  repel,  them.  Nev- 
ertheless, the  two  nations  of  the  world  which  claim  best  to  understand  the 
principles  of  commerce,  are  now  engaged  in  a  crusade  against  those  notes ; 
and  in  the  vain  hope  of  thereby  rendering  their  several  countries  more 
attractive  of  the  produce  of  the  mines  of  Peru,  and  Mexico,  Australia  and 
California.  In  this  case,  England  follows  in  our  lead — Sir  Robert  Peel's 
restrictions  being  later  in  date,  by  several  years,  than  the  declaration  of 
war  against  circulating  notes  fulminated  by  our  government. 

It  is  a  pure  absurdity ;  and  its  adoption  here  is  due  to  the  fact  that  our 
system  of  policy  tends  to  that  expulsion  of  the  precious  metals  which  always 
must  result  from  the  long-continued  export  of  the  raw  products  of  the  earth. 
The  administration  that  adopted  what  is  called  free  trade,  was  the  same  that 
commenced  the  system  of  compelling  the  community  to  use  gold  instead  of 
notes ;  and  the  result  was  found  in  the  disappearance  from  circulation  of 
coin  of  any  description  whatsoever.  From  that  time  to  the  present,  the 
motto  of  the  generally  dominant  party  of  the  Union  has  been — "  War  to 
the  death  against  bank-notes;"  and,  with  a  view  to  promote  their  expul- 

27 


Money. 

sion,  laws  have  been  passed  in  various  States  forbidding  their  use  except 
when  of  too  large  size  to  enter  freely  into  the  transactions  of  the  community. 
As  must,  however,  inevitably  be  the  case  the  tendency  to  the  loss  of  the 
precious  metals  has  always  been  in  the  direct  ratio  of  the  diminution  in 
their  utility  thus  produced.  At  one  time  only,  in  almost  twenty  years,  has 
there  been  an  excess  import  of  those  metals,  and  that  was  under  the  tariff 
of  1842.  Then,  money  became  abundant  and  cheap,  because  the  policy 
of  the  country  looked  to  the  promotion  of  association  and  the  extension 
of  commerce.  Now,  it  is  scarce  and  dear,  because  that  policy  limits  the 
power  of  association,  and  established  the  supremacy  of  trade. 

18.  Of  all  the  machinery  in  use  among  men,  there  is  none  whose  yield 
is  so  great  in  proportion  to  its  cost  as  that  employed  in  effecting  exchanges 
from  hand  to  hand — none  whose  movements  inward  or  outward  are  so 
strong  an  evidence  of  increase  or  decrease  of  the  productive  power  of  the 
community — none,  therefore,  that  affords  the  statesman  so  excellent  a  ba- 
rometer by  means  of  which  to  judge  of  the  working  of  his  measures.  It 
is  nevertheless,  of  all  others,  the  one  whose  movements  are,  by  economists 
generally,  regarded  as  least  worthy  of  consideration.  By  many  of  them 
we  are  even  taught  that  the  only  effect  of  an  increase  in  the  supply  of  a 
commodity  whose  possession  is  so  anxiously  sought  by  all  mankind,  is 
that  instead  of  having  the  labor  of  counting  out  one,  two,  or  three  hun- 
dred pieces, we  should  be  forced  to  count  three,  six,  or  nine  hundred;  and 
that,  therefore,  there  is  economy  in  being  forced  to  perform  the  work  of 
exchange  with  the  smallest  quantity  of  the  machinery  by  aid  of  which, 
alone,  it  can  be  performed.  All  the  teachings  on  this  subject  are  in  direct 
opposition  to  those  of  the  common  sense  of  mankind ;  and,  as  is  usually 
the  case,  that  to  which  all  men  are  prompted  by  a  sense  of  their  own  in- 
terests, is  far  more  nearly  right  than  that  which  is  taught  by  philosophers 
who  look  inward  to  their  own  minds  for  the  laws  which  govern  man  and 
matter — refusing  to  study  the  movements  of  the  people  by  whom  they  are 
surrounded. 

The  uninstructed  savage  finds  in  the  waterspout  and  the  earthquake  the 
most  conclusive  proof  of  the  wonderful  power  of  nature.  The  man  of  sci- 
ence finds  it  in  the  magnificent,  but  unseen,  machinery  by  means  of  which 
the  waters  of  the  ocean  are  daily  raised,  to  descend  again  in  refreshing 
dews  and  summer  showers.  He  finds  it,  too,  in  that  insensible  perspira- 
tion which  carries  off  so  nearly  the  whole  amount  of  food  absorbed  by  men 
and  animals.  Again ;  he  sees  it  in  the  workings  of  the  little  animals, 
invisible  to  the  naked  eye,  to  whom  we  are  indebted  for  the  creation  of 
islands,  elaborated  out  of  earth  that  has  been  carried  from  the  mountains 
to  the  sea,  and  there  deposited.  Studying  these  facts,  he  is  led  to  the 
conclusion,  that  it  is  in  the  minute  and  almost  insensible  operation  of  the 
physical  laws  he  is  to  find  the  highest  proof  of  the  power  of  nature,  and 
the  largest  amount  of  force.  So,  too,  is  it  in  the  social  world.  To  the 
uninstructed  savage,  the  ship  presents  most  forcibly  the  idea  of  commerce. 
The  mere  trader  finds  it  in  the  transport  of  cargoes  of  cotton,  wheat,  or 
lumber ;  and  in  the  making  of  bills  of  exchange  for  tens  of  thousands  of 
dollars,  or  of  pounds.  The  student  of  social  science,  on  the  contrary, 
sees  it  in  the  exercise  of  a  power  of  association  and  combination  resulting 

28 


Money. 

from  development  of  the  various  human  faculties,  and  enabling  each  and 
every  member  of  society  to  exchange  his  days,  hours,  and  minutes  for 
commodities  and  things  to  whose  production  have  been  applied  the  days, 
hours,  and  minutes  of  the  various  persons  with  whom  he  is  associated. 
For  that  commerce,  pence,  sixpences,  and  shillings  are  required ;  and  in 
them  he  finds  willing  slaves,  whose  operations  bear  to  those  of  the  ship, 
the  same  relation  that  is  elsewhere  borne  by  the  little  coral  insect  to  the 
elephant. 

It  is  by  means  of  combination  of  effort  that  man  advances  in  civiliza- 
tion. Association  brings  into  activity  all  the  various  powers,  mental  and 
physical,  of  the  beings  of  which  society  is  composed,  and  individuality 
grows  with  the  growth  of  the  power  of  combination.  That  power  it  is 
which  enables  the  many  who  are  poor  and  weak,  to  triumph  over  the  few 
who  are  rich  and  strong;  and  therefore  it  is  that  men  become  more  free 
with  every  advance  in  wealth  and  population.  To  enable  them  to  asso- 
ciate, they  need  an  instrument  by  help  of  which  the  process  of  composi- 
tion, decomposition,  and  recomposition  of  the  various  forces  may  readily 
be  effected ;  so  that  while  all  unite  to  produce  the  effect  desired,  each  may 
have  his  share  of  the  benefits  thence  resulting.  That  instrument  was  fur- 
nished in  those  metals  which  stand  almost  alone  in  the  fact,  that,  as  Mi- 
nerva sprang  fully  armed  from  the  head  of  Jove,  they,  wherever  found, 
come  forth  ready — requiring  no  elaboration,  no  alteration,  to  fit  them  for 
the  great  work  for  which  they  were  intended,  that  of  enabling  men  to 
combine  their  efforts  for.  filling  worthily  the  post  at  the  head  of  creation 
for  which  they  were  designed.  Of  all  the  instruments  at  the  command 
of  man,  there  are  none  that  tend  in  so  large  a  degree  to  promote  individu- 
ality on  the  one  hand,  and  association  on  the  other,  as  do  gold  and  silver 
— properly,  therefore,  denominated  THE  PRECIOUS  METALS. 


29 


FINANCIAL  CRISES: 


THEIE 


CAUSES    AND    EFFECTS. 


BY 

HENRY    C.   CAREY. 


PHILADELPHIA: 
HENRY    CAREY    BAIRD, 

INDUSTRIAL    PUBLISHER, 

No.    406    WALNUT    STREET. 

1864. 


FINANCIAL  CRISES:   THEIR  CAUSES  AND  EFFECTS. 


LETTER    FIRST. 

DEAR  SIR.  —  In  your  recent  and  highly  interesting  volume,  which 
I  have  just  now  read,  there  is  a  passage  to  which,  on  account  of  its  great 
importance  as  regards  the  progress  of  man  towards  an  ultimate  state  of 
perfect  freedom  or  absolute  slavery,  I  feel  disposed  to  invite  your  atten- 
tion. It  is  as  follows :  "  I  am  pained  to  hear  such  bad  news  from  the 
United  States — such  accounts  of  embarrassments  and  failures,  of  sud- 
den poverty  falling  on  the  opulent,  and  thousands  left  destitute  of  em- 
ployment, and  perhaps  of  bread.  This  is  one  of  the  epidemic  visitations 
against  which,  I  fear,  no  human  prudence  can  provide,  so  far,  at  least, 
as  to  prevent  their  recurrence  at  longer  or  shorter  intervals,  any  more 
than  it  can  prevent  the  scarlet  fever  or  the  cholera.  A  money  market 
always  in  perfect  health  and  soundness  would  imply  infallible  wisdom  in 
those  who  conduct  its  operations.  I  hope  to  hear  news  of  a  better  state 
of  things  before  I  write  again." 

Is  this  really  so  ?  Can  it  be,  that  the  frequent  recurrence  of  such 
calamities  is  beyond  the  reach  of  man's  prevention  ?  To  admit  that  so 
it  certainly  was,  would  be,  as  it  seems  to  me,  to  admit  that  Providence 
had  so  adjusted  the  laws  under  which  we  exist,  as  to  produce  those  "epi- 
demic visitations"  of  which  you  speak,  and  ofVhich  the  direct  effect, 
as  all  must  see,  is  that  of  placing  those  who  need  to  sell  their  labor  at 
the  mercy  of  those  who  have  food  and  clothing  with  which  to  purchase 
it  —  increasing  steadily  the  wealth,  strength,  and  power  of  these  latter, 
while  making  the  former  poorer  and  more  enslaved.  Look  around  you, 
in  New  York,  at  the  present  moment,  and  study  the  effects,  in  this  re- 
spect, of  the  still-enduring  crisis  of  1857.  Turn  back  to  those  of  1822 
and  1842,  and  see  how  strong  has  been  their  tendency  to  compel  the 
transfer  of  property  from  the  hands  of  persons  of  moderate  means  to 
those  of  men  who  were  already  rich — reducing  the  former,  with  their 
wives  and  children,  in  thousands,  if  not  even  hundreds  of  thousands  of 
cases,  to  the  condition  of  mere  laborers,  while  largely  augmenting  the 
number  and  the  fortunes  of  "merchant  princes"  who  have  no  need  to 
live  by  labor.  Look  around  you  and  study  the  growth  in  the  number 
of  your  millionaires,  side  by  side  with  a  pauperism  now  exceeding  in  its 
proportions  that  of  Britain,  or  even  that  of  Ireland.  Look  next  to  the 
condition  of  the  men  who  labor  throughout  the  country,  deprived  as  they 
have  been,  and  yet  are,  of  anything  approaching  to  steadiness  of  demand 
For  their  services,  in  default  of  which  they  have  been,  for  two  years  past, 
unable  suitably  to  provide  for  their  wives,  their  children,  or  themselves. 
Study  then  the  condition  of  the  rich  money-lenders  throughout  the  coun- 


4  FINANCIAL  CRISES: 

try,  enabled,  as  they  have  been,  to  demand  one,  two,  three,  and  even 
four  and  five  per  cent  per  month,  from  the  miners,  manufacturers,  and 
little  farmers  of  the  Union,  until  these  latter  have  been  entirely  eaten 
out  of  house  and  home.  Having  done  all  this,  you  can  scarcely  fail  to 
arrive  at  the  conclusion,  that  unsteadiness  in  the  societary  movement 
tends  towards  slavery  —  that  steadiness  therein,  on  the  contrary,  tends 
towards  the  emancipation  of  those  who  have  labor  to  sell  from  the  domi- 
nation of  those  who  require  to  buy -it — and  that,  therefore,  the  question 
referred  to  in  the  passage  I  have  quoted,  is  one  of  the  highest  interest  to 
all  of  those  who,  like  yourself,  are  placed  in  a  position  to  guide  their 
fellow-men  in  their  search  for  prosperity,  happiness,  and  freedom. 

The  larger  the  diversity  in  the  demand  for  human  powers,  the  more 
perfect  becomes  the  division  of  employments,  the  larger  is  the  produc- 
tion, the  greater  the  power  of  accumulation,  the  more  rapid  the  in- 
crease of  competition  for  the  purchase  of  the  laborer's  services,  and  the 
greater  the  tendency  towards  the  establishment  of  human  freedom.  The 
greater  that  tendency,  the  more  rapid  becomes  the  societary  action 
—  its  regularity  increasing  with  every  stage  of  progress.  In  proof  of 
this,  look  to  that  world  in  miniature,  your  own  printing-office,  studying 
its  movements,  as  compared  with  those  of  little  country  offices,  in  which 
a  single  person  not  unfrequently  combines  in  himself  all  the  employments 
that  with  you  are  divided  among  a  hundred,  from  editor-in-chief  to  news- 
boy. The  less  the  division  of  employments,  the  slower  and  more  unstead) 
becomes  the  motion,  the  less  is  the  power  of  production  and  accumu- 
lation, the  greater  is  the  competition  for  the  sale  of  labor,  and  the  greater 
is  the  tendency  towards  the  enslavement  of  the  laborer,  be  he  black  or 
white. 

The  nearer  the  consumer  to  the  producer,  the  more  instant  and  the 
more  regular  become  the  exchanges  of  service,  whether  in  the  shape 
of  labor  for  money,  or  food  for  cloth.  The  more  distant  the  producer 
and  consumer,  the  slo\ier  and  more  irregular  do  exchanges  become,  and 
the  greater  is  the  tendency  to  have  the  laborer  suffer  in  the  absence  of 
the  power  for  obtain  wages,  and  the  producer  of  wool  perish  of  cold  in 
the  absence  of  the  power  to  obtain  cloth.  That  this  is  so,  is  proved  by 
an  examination  of  the  movements  of  the  various  nations  of  the  world, 
at  the  present  moment.  Being  so,  it  is  clear,  that  if  we  would  avoid 
those  crises  of  which  you  have  spoken — if  we  would  have  regularity  of 
the  societary  movement — and  if  we  would  promote  the  growth  of  free- 
dom— we  must  adopt  the  measures  needed  for  bringing  together  the  pro- 
ducers and  consumers  of  food  and  wool,  and  thus  augmenting  their  power 
to  have  commerce  among  themselves. 

The  essential  characteristic  of  barbarism  is  found  in  instability  and 
irregularity  of  the  societary  action  —  evidence  of  growing  civilization 
being,  on  the  contrary,  found  in  a  constantly  augmenting  growth  of  that 
regularity  which  tends  to  produce  equality,  and  to  promote  the  growth 
of  freedom.  Turn,  if  you  please,  to  the  Wealth  of  Nations,  and  mark  the 
extraordinary  variations  in  the  prices  of  wheat  in  the  days  of  the  Plan- 
tagenets,  from  six  shillings,  in  money  of  the  present  time,  in  1243,  to 
forty-eiyht  in  1246,  seventy-two  in  1257,  three  hundred  and  thirty-six  in 
1270,  and  twenty-eight  in  1286.  That  done,  see  how  trivial  have  been 
the  changes  of  France  and  England,  from  the  close  of  the  war  in  1815, 


THEIR  CAUSES   AND   EFFECTS.  5 

to  the  present  time.  Next,  turn  to  Russia,  and  mark  the  fact,  given  to 
us  by  a  recent  British  traveller,  that,  in  those  parts  of  the  country  that 
have  no  manufactures,  the  farmer  is  everywhere  "  the  victim  of  circum- 
stances "  over  which  he  has  no  control  whatsoever — the  prices  of  his  pro- 
ducts being  dependent  entirely  upon  the  greater  or  smaller  size  of  the 
crops  of  other  lands,  and  he  being  ruined  at  the  very  moment  when  the 
return  to  his  labor  has  been  the  most  abundant.  Look  then  to  the  changes 
throughout  our  own  great  West  in  the  present  year — wheat  having  fallen 
from  $1.30  in  May  to  50  cts.  in  July  —  and  you  will  see  how  nearly  the 
state  of  things  with  us  approximates  to  that  of  Russia.  Compare  all  this 
with  the  movements  of  England,  France,  and  Germany,  and  you  will, 
most  assuredly,  be  led  to  arrive  at  the  conclusion,  that  the  stability  whose 
absence  you  deplore,  is  to  be  sought  by  means  of  measures  looking  to  the 
close  approximation  of  the  producer  and  the  consumer,  and  to  the  ex- 
tension of  domestic  commerce. 

Five  years  since,  British  journals  nearly  all  united  in  predicting  the 
advent  of  a  great  financial  crisis,  the  seat  of  which  would  be  found  in 
France  and  Germany.  More  careful  observation  might  have  satisfied 
them  that  the  tendency  towards  such  crises  was  always  in  the  direct  ratio 
of  the  distance  of  consumers  from  producers,  and  that  the  real  places 
in  which  to  look  for  that  which  was  then  predicted,  were  those  coun- 
tries which  most  seemed  bent  on  separating  the  producers  and  consu- 
mers of  the  world,  Britain  and  America — the  one  seeking  to  drive  all  its 
people  into  the  workshops,  and  the  other  laboring  to  compel  them  all  to 
seek  the  fields,  and  both  thus  acting  in  direct  defiance  of  the  advice  of 
Adam  Smith.  The  crisis  came,  spending  its  force  upon  those  two  coun- 
tries— France,  Belgium,  and  Germany  escaping  almost  entirely  unharmed, 
and  for  the  reason,  that  in  all  these  latter  the  farm  and  the  workshop 
were  coming  daily  more  near  together,  and  commerce  was  becoming  more 
rapid,  free,  and  regular. 

Russia  and  Sweden  have,  however,  suffered  much  —  the  crisis  having 
become,  apparently,  as  permanent  as  it  is  among  ourselves.  Why  should 
this  be  so  ?  Why  should  they  be  paralyzed,  while  France  and  Germany 
escape  uninjured  ?  Because,  while  these  latter  have  persisted  in  main- 
taining that  protection  which  is  needed  for  promoting  the  approximation 
of  producers  and  consumers,  the  former  have,  within  the  last  three  years, 
departed  essentially  from  the  system  under  which  they  had  been  so  rapidly 
advancing  towards  wealth  and  freedom — adopting  the  policy  advocated 
by  those  writers  who  see  in  the  cheapening  of  the  labor  and  of  the  raw 
materials  of  other  countries,  the  real  British  road  to  wealth  and  power. 
Throughout  Northern  and  Central  Europe,  there  has  been,  in  the  last 
half  century,  a  rapid  increase  in  the  steadiness  of  the  societary  move- 
ment, and  in  the  freedom  of  man — that  increase  being  the  natural  con- 
sequence of  increased  rapidity  of  motion  resulting  from  a  growing  diver- 
sification in  the  demand  for  human  services,  and  growing  competition 
for  the  purchase  of  labor.  In  Ireland,  India,  Spanish  America,  and 
Turkey,  the  reverse  of  this  is  seen  —  producers  and  consumers  beco- 
ming more  widely  separated,  and  exchanges  becoming  more  fitful  and 
irregular,  with  growing  competition  for  the  sale  of  labor.  Why  this 
difference  ?  Because  the  policy  of  the  former  has  been  directed 'towards 
protecting  the  farmer  in  his  efforts  to  draw  the  market  nearer  to  'him, 


6  FINANCIAL  CRISES: 

and  thus  diminish  the  wasting  tax  of  transportation,  while  the  latter 
have  been  steadily  becoming  more  and  more  subjected  to  the  system 
which  seeks  to  locate  in  the  little  island  of  Britain  the  single  workship 
of  the  world. 

How  it  has  been  among  ourselves,  is  shown  in  the  following  brief 
statement  of  the  facts  of  the  last  half  century.  From  the  date  of  the 
passage  of  the  act  of  1816,  by  which  the  axe  was  laid  to  the  root  of  our 
then-rapidly-growing  manufactures,  our  foreign  trade  steadily  declined, 
until,  in  1821,  the  value  of  ou*  imports  was  less  than  half  of  what  it 
had  been  six  years  before.  Thenceforward,  there  was  little  change  until 
the  highly-protective  act  of  1828  came  fairly  into  operation  —  the  ave- 
rage amount  of  our  importations,  from  1822  to  1830,  having  been  but 
80  millions — and  the  variations  having  been  between  96  millions  in  one 
year  and  70  in  another.  Under  that  tariff,  the  domestic  commerce  grew 
with  great  rapidity  —  enabling  our  people  promptly  to  sell  their  labor, 
and  to  become  better  customers  to  the  people  of  other  lands,  as  is  shown 
by  the  following  figures,  representing  the  value  of  goods  imported : 

1830-31 $103,000,000 

1831-32 101,000,000 

1832-33 108,000,000 

1833-34 126,000,000 

Here,  my  dear  sir,  is  a  nearly  regular  growth  —  the  last  of  these  years 
being  by  far  the  highest,  and  exceeding,  by  more  than  50  per  cent, 
the  average  of  the  eight  years  from  1822  to  1830.  In  this  period,  not 
only  did  we  contract  no  foreign  debt,  but  we  paid  off  the  whole  of  that 
which  previously  had  existed,  the  legacy  of  the  war  of  independence ; 
and  it  is  with  nations  as  with  individuals,  that  "  out  of  debt  is  out  of 
danger." 

The  compromise  tariff  began  now  to  exert  its  deleterious  influence 

—  stopping  the  building  of  mills  and  the  opening  of  mines,  and  thus 
lessening  the  power  to  maintain  domestic  commerce.    How  it  operated  on 
that  with  foreign  nations,  is  shown  in  the  facts,  that  the  imports  of 
1837  went  up  to  $189,000,000,  and  those  of  1838  down  to  $113,000,000 

—  those  of  1839  up  to  $162,000,000,  and   those  of  1840  down  to 
$107,000,000 ;  while  those  of  1842  were  less  than  they  had  been  ten  years 
before.     In  this  period,  we  ran  in  debt  to  foreigners  to  the  extent  .of 
hundreds  of  millions,  and  closed  with  a  bankruptcy  so  universal,  as  to 
have  embraced  individuals,  banks,  towns,  cities,  States,  and  the  national 
treasury  itself. 

That  instability  is  the  essential  characteristic  of  the  system  called  free- 
trade,  will  be  obvious  to  you  on  the  most  cursory  examination  of  the 
facts  presented  by  the  several  periods  of  that  system  through  which  we 
have  thus  far  passed.  From  more  than  $100,000,000,  in  1817,  our  im- 
ports fell,  in  1821,  to  $62,000,000.  In  1825,  they  rose  to  $96,000,000, 
and  then,  two  years  later,  they  were  but  $79,000,000.  From  1829  to 
1834,  they  grew  almost  regularly,  but  no  sooner  had  protection  been 
abandoned,  than  instability,  with  its  attendant  speculation,  reappeared 
— the  imports  of  1836  having  been  greater,  by  45  per  cent,  than  those 
of  1834,  and  those  of  1840  little  more  than  half  as  great  as  those  of  1836. 

Once  again,  in  1842,  protection  was  restored ;  and  once  again  do  we 


THEIR  CAUSES  AND   EFFECTS.  7 

find  a  steady  and  regular  growth  in  the  power  to  maintain  intercourse 
with  the  outer  world,  consequent  upon  the  growth  of  domestic  commerce, 
as  is  shown  in  the  following  figures : 

1843-44 $108,000,000 

i44-45 1 17,000,000 

1845-46 121,000,000 

1846-47 146,000,000 

We  have  here  a  constant  increase  of  power  to  go  to  foreign  markets, 
accompanied  by  a  constant  decrease  in  the  necessity  for  resorting  to  them 
—  the  domestic  production  of  cotton  and  woollen  goods  having  doubled 
in  this  brief  period,  while  the  domestic  production  of  iron  had  more 
than  trebled. 

Twelve  years  having  elapsed  since  the  tariff  of  1846  became  fairly 
operative,  we  have  now  another  opportunity  for  contrasting  the  operation 
of  that  policy  under  which  Russia  and  Sweden  are  now  suffering,  with 
that  of  the  one  under  which  they  had  made  such  rapid  progress  —  that 
one  which  is  still  maintained  by  Germany  and  by  France.  Doing  this, 
we  find  the  same  instability  which  characterized  the  periods  which  pre- 
ceded the  passage  of  the  protective  tariff  acts  of  1824, 1828,  and  1842, 
and  on  a  larger  scale — the  imports  having  been  $178,000,000  in  1850, 
$304,000,000  in  1854,  $260,000,000  in  1855,  $360,000,000  in  1857, 
$282,000,000  in  1858,  and  $338,000,000  in  1859 —  and  our  foreign 
debt,  with  all  its  tendency  towards  producing  those  crises  which  you  so 
much  deplore,  having  been  augmented  probably  not  kss  than  three  hun- 
dred millions  of  dollars. 

Ten  years  since,  .there  was  made  the  great  discovery  of  the  Califor- 
nian  gold  deposits— a  discovery  whose  effect,  we  were  then  assured,  was 
to  be  that  of  greatly  reducing  the  rate  of  interest  paid  by  those  who 
labored  to  those  others  who  were  already  rich.  Have  such  results  been 
thus  far  realized  ?  Are  not,  on  the  contrary,  our  workingmen  —  our 
miners  and  manufacturers,  our  laborers  and  our  settlers  of  the  West  — 
now  paying  thrice  the  price  for  the  use  of  money  that  was  paid  at  the 
date  of  the  passage  of  the  tariff  act  of  1846  ?  Are  not  these  latter,  at 
this  moment,  paying  three,  four,  five,  and  even  as  high  as  six  per  cent 
per  month  ?  Are  they  not  paying  more  per  month,  than  is  paid  per  year 
by  the  farmers  of  the  protected  countries  of  the  European  world  ?  That 
they  are  so,  is  beyond  a  doubt.  Why  it  is  so  is,  that  although  we  have 
received  from  California  five  hundred  millions  of  gold,  we  have  been 
compelled  to  export,  in  payment  for  foreign  food  in  the  form  of  iron 
and  lead,  cloths  and  silks,  more  than  four  hundred  millions  —  leaving 
behind  little  more  than  has  been  required  for  consumption  in  the  arts. 
Had  we  made  our  own  iron  and  our  qwn  cloth,  thus  making  a  domestic 
market  for  the  products  of  our  farms,  would  not  much  of  this  gold  have 
remained  at  home  ?  Had  it  so  remained,  would  not  our  little  farmers 
find  it  easier  to  obtain  the  aid  of  capital  at  the  rate  of  six  per  cent 
per  annum,  than  they  now  do  at  three,  four,  or  five  per  cent  per  month  f 
Would  not  their  power  of  self-government  be  far  greater  than  it  is  now, 
under  a  system  that,  as  we  see,  makes  the  poor  poorer,  while  the  very 
rich  grow  richer  every  day  ?  Reflect,  I  pray  you,  upon  these  questions 
and  these  facts,  and  then  answer  to  yourself  if  the  crises  of  which  you 


8  FINANCIAL  CRISES: 

speak  are  not  the  necessary  results  of  an  erroneous  policy  of  which, 
during  so  long  a  period,  you  have  been  the  steady  advocate. 

The  history  of  the  Union  for  the  past  half  century  may  now  briefly 
thus  be  stated :  We  have  had  three  periods  of  protection,  closing  in 
1817,  1834,  and  1847,  each  and  all  of  them  leaving  the  country  in  a 
state  of  the  highest  prosperity  —  competition  for  the  purchase  of  labor 
then  growing  daily  and  rapidly,  with  constant  tendency  towards  increase 
in  the  amount  of  commerce,  in  the  steadiness  of  the  societary  action. 
and  in  the  freedom  of  the  men  who  needed  to  sell  their  labor. 

We  have  had  three  periods  of  that  system  which  looks  to  the  destruc- 
tion of  domestic  commerce,  and  is  called  free  trade — that  system  which 
prevails  in  Ireland  and  India,  Portugal  and  Turkey,  and  is  advocated  by 
British  journalists — each  and  all  of  them  having  led  to  crises  such  as 
you  have  so  well  described,  to  wit,  in  1822,  1842,  and  1857.  In  each 
and  every  case,  they  have  left  the  country  in  a  state  of  paralysis,  similar 
to  that  which  now  exists.  In  all  of  them,  the  exchanges  have  become 
more  and  more  languid,  the  societary  movement  has  become  more  and 
more  irregular,  and  the  men  who  have  needed  to  sell  their  labor  have 
become  more  and  more  mere  instruments  in  the. hands  of  those  who  had 
food  and  clothing  with  which  to  purchase  it. 

All  experience,  abroad  and  at  home,  tends,  thus,  to  prove  that  men 
became  more  free  as  the  domestic  commerce  becomes  more  regular, 
and  less  and  less  free  as  it  becomes  more  and  more  fitful  and  disturbed. 
Such  being  the  case,  the  questions  as  to  the  causes  of  crises,  and  as  to 
how  they  may  be  avoided,  assume  a  new  importance  —  one  greatly 
exceeding,  as  I  imagine,  that  which  you  felt  disposed  to  attach  to  them 
when  writing  the  passage  which  has  above  been  given.  To  my  appre- 
hension, they  are  questions  of  liberty  and  slavery,  and  therefore  it  is 
that  I  feel  disposed  to  invite  you,  as  a  friend  of  human  freedom,  to 
their  discussion  through  .the  columns  of  your  own  journal,  the  Evening 
Post — that  discussion  to  be  carried  on  in  the  spirit  of  men  who  seek  for 
truth,  and  not  for  victory.  If  you  can  satisfy  me  that  I  am  in  error  as 
to  either  facts  or  deductions,  I  will  at  once  admit  it;  and  you,  I  feel 
assured,  will  do  the  same.  As  an  inducement  to  such  discussion,  I  now 
offer  to  have  all  your  articles  reprinted  in  protectionist  journals,  to  the 
extent  of  300,000  copies  —  thereby  giving  you  not  less  than  a  million 
and  a  half  of  readers,  among  the  most  intelligent  people  of  the  Union. 
In  return,  I  ask  of  you  only,  that  you  will  publish  my  replies  in  your 
single  journal,  with  its  circulation  of,  as  I  am  told,  fifteen  or  twenty 
thousand.  That  this  is  offering  great  odds,  you  must  admit. 

It  may,  however,  be  said,  that  the  replies  might  be  such'  as  would 
occupy  too  large  a  portion  of  your  paper ;  and  to  meet  that  difficulty,  I 
now  stipulate  that  they  shall  not,  exceed  the  length  of  the  articles  to 
which  answers  are  to  be  given  —  thus  leaving  you  entire  master  of  the 
space  to  be  given  to  the  discussion.  Hoping  to  hear  that  you  assent  to 
this  proposition,  I  remain,  very  respectfully, 

Your  obedient  servant, 

HENRY  C.  CAREY. 
W.  C.  BETANT,  ESQ. 

PHILADELPHIA;  December  27,  1859. 


THEIR   CAUSES   AND   EFFECTS. 


LETTER    SECOND. 

DEAR  SIR. — Allow  me  now  to  ask  you  why  it  is,  that  great  specula- 
tions, followed  by  crises  and  by  almost  total  paralyses,  such  as  you  have 
so  well  described,  always  occur  in  free  trade  times,  and  never  in  periods 
when  the  policy  of  the  country  is  being  directed  towards  the  creation 
of  domestic  markets,  and  towards  the  relief  of  our  farmers  from  the 
terrific  taxes  of  trade  and  transportation  to  which  they  are  now  subjected? 
That  such  are  the  facts,  you  can  readily  satisfy  yourself  by  looking  back 
to  the  great  speculations  of  the  four  periods  of  1817,  1836,  1839,  and 
1856,  followed  by  the  crises  of,  1822,  1837, 1842,  and  1857  — and  then 
comparing  them  with  the  remarkable  steadiness  of  movement  which  cha- 
racterized those  of  the  protective  tariffs  of  1828  and  1842.  Study  our 
financial  history  as  you  may,  you  will  find  in  its  every  page  new  evidence 
of  the  soundness  of  the  views  of  Washington,  Jefferson,  and  Hamilton, 
Adams,  Madison,  and  Monroe,  each  and  all  of  whom  had  full  belief  in 
the  accuracy  of  the  ideas  so  well  enunciated  by  General  Jackson,  when 
he  declared  that  we  "  had  been  too  long  subject  to  the  policy  of  British 
merchants" — that  it  was  "  time  we  should  become  a  little  more  Ameri- 
canized"—  and  that,  if  we  continued  longer  the  policy  of  feeding  "the 
paupers  and  laborers  of  England "  in  preference  to  our  own,  we  should 
"  all  be  rendered  paupers  ourselves." 

Why  is  all  this  ?  Why  must  it  be  so  ?  Why  must,  and  that  inevi- 
tably, speculation,  to  be  followed  by  crises,  paralyses,  and  daily-grqwing 
pauperism,  be  the  invariable  attendant  upon  the  policy  which  looks  to 
the  separation  of  the  producer  of  raw  products  from  the  consumer  of 
the  finished  commodities  into  which  rude  materials  are  converted  ?  To 
obtain  an  answer  to  all  these  questions,  let  us  look  again,  for  a  moment, 
to  the  proceedings  connected  with  the  printing  and  publication  of  th* 
Evening  Post.  Dealing  directly  with  your  paper-maker,  you  pay  him  cash, 
or  give  him  notes,  in  exchange  for  which  he  readily  obtains  the  money 
—  no  artificial  credit  having  been  created. .  Place  yourself  now,  if  you 
please,  at  a  distance  of  several  thousand  miles  from  the  manufacturer, 
and  count  the  many  hands  through  which  your  paper  would  have  to 
pass  —  each  and  every  change  giving  occasion  to  the  creation  of  notes 
and  bills,  and  to  the  charge  of  commissions  and  storage ;  and  you  will,  as 
I  think,  be  disposed  to  arrive  with  me  at  the  conclusion,  that  the  tendency 
towards  the  creation  of  artificial  credits,  and  towards  speculation,  grows 
with  the  growth  of  the  power  of  t'h^e  middleman  to  tax  the  producers 
and  consumers  of  the  world. 

Seeking  further  evidence  of  this,  let  me  ask  you  to  look  at  the  cir- 
cumstances which  attend  the  sale  of  your  products.  Now,  your  custo- 
mers being  close  at  hand,  you  are  paid  in  cash — your  whole  year's  busi- 
ness not  giving,  as  I  suppose,  occasion  for  the  creation  of  a  single  note. 
Change  your  position,  putting  yourself  in  that,  of  the  Manchester  manu- 
facturers, at  a  distance  of  thousands  of  miles  from  your  customers,  com- 
pelled to  deal  with  traders  and  transporters,  and  study  the  quantity  of 


10'  FINANCIAL  CRISES: 

notes  and  bills,  with  their  attendant  charges,  that  would  be  created — the 
augmentation  of  price  and  diminution  of  consumption  that  would  be  the 
consequence — the  power  that  would  be  accumulated  in  the  hands  of  those 
who  had  money  to  invest,  and  desired  to  produce  such  crises  as  those 
which  you  have  so  well  depicted — and  you  will,  most  assuredly,  arrive  at 
the  conclusion  that  there  is  but  one  road  towards  steadiness  and  free- 
dom, and  that  that  road  is  to  be  found  in  the  direction  of  measures  having 
for  their  object  the  more  close  approximation  of  the  producers  and  con- 
sumers of  the  products  of  the  earth. 

Studying  next  the  great  facts  of  our  financial  history,  with  a  view  to 
ascertain  how  far  they  are  in  accordance  with  the  theory  you  may  thus 
have  formed,  you  will  see  that,  in  those  prosperous  years  of  the  tariff  of 
1828,  from  1830  to  1833,  the  quantity  of  bank  notes  in  circulation  was 
but  80  millions.  No  sooner,  however,  had  we  entered  upon  the  free 
trade  policy,  providing  for  the  gradual  diminution  and  ultimate  aboli- 
tion of  protection,  than  we  find  a  rapid  growth  of  speculation,  conse- 
quent upon  the  growing  power  for  the  creation  of  artificial  credits — the 
average  circulation  of  the  years  from  1834  to  1837  having  been  no  less 
than  149  millions,  or  nearly  twice  what  it  before  had  been.  Under 
the  protective  tariff  of  1842,  the  average  was  but  76  millions ;  but  no 
sooner  had  protection  been  abandoned,  than  we  find  an  increase  so  rapid 
as  to  have  carried  up  the  average  from  1846  to  1849,  to  113,  and  that  of 
1850  and  1851,  to  143  millions.  In  that  period  speculation  had  largely 
grown,  but  prosperity  had  as  much  declined.  When  the  circulation  was 
small,  domestic  commerce  was  great  —  mines  having  been  opened,  fur- 
naces and  factories  having  been  built,  and  labor  having  found  its  full 
reward.  When,  on  the  contrary,  the  circulation  had  become  so  great, 
mines  were  being  closed  and  miners  were  being  ruined  —  furnaces  and 
factories  were  being  sold  by  the  sheriff,  and  our  people  were  unemployed. 
In  the  one  case,  men  were  becoming  more  free,  while  in  the  other  they 
were  gradually  losing  the  power  to  determine  for  themselves  to  whom 
they  would  sell  their  labor,  or  what  should  be  its  reward.  In  the  one, 
there  was  a  growing  competition  for  the  purchase  of  the  laborer's  ser- 
vices. In  the  other,  there  was  increasing  competition  for  their  sale.  Such 
having  invariably  been  the  case,  can  you,  my  dear  sir,  hesitate  to  believe, 
that  the  question  to  whose,  discussion  I  have  invited  you,  is  not  one 
of  the  prices  of  cotton  or  woollen  cloths,  but  is,  really,  that  of  man's  pro- 
gress towards  that  perfect  freedom  of  action  which  we  should  all  desire 
foy  ourselves  and  those  around  us,  on  the  one  hand,  or  his  decline  towards 
slavery,  and  its  attendant  barbarism,  on  the  other?  That,  as  it  seems  to 
me,  you  can  scarcely  do. 

At  no  period  in  the  history  of  the  Union  has  competition  for  the  pur- 
chase of  labor,  accompanied  by  growing  tendency  towards  improvement 
in  the  condition  of  the  laborer,  been  so  universal  or  so  great  as  in  1815, 
1834,  and  1847,  the  closing  years  of  the  several  periods  in  which  the 
policy  of  the  country  was  directed  towards  the  approximation  of  the 
producers  and  consumers  of  the  country,  by  means  of  measures  of  pro- 
tection. At  none,  has  the  competition  for  its  safe,  with  corresponding 
decline  in  the  laborer's  condition,  been  so  great  as  in  the  closing  years 
of  the  free  trade  periods,  to  wit.  from  1822  to  1824,  and  from  1840  to 
1842. 


THEIR  CAUSES   AND   EFFECTS.  11 

Great  as  was  the  prosperity  with  which  we  closed  the  period  which  had 
commenced  in  this  latter  year,  three  short  years  of  the  tariff  of  1846 
sufficed  for  reproducing  that  competition  for  the  sale  of  labor,  relief  from 
which  had  heen  the  object  of  the  men  who  made  the  tariff  of  1842. 
From  the  decline  with  which  we  then  were  menaced,  we  were  relieved 
by  the  discovery  of  the  Californian  mines,  and  by  that  alone.  Since 
then,  we  have  thence  received  more  than  five  hundred  millions  of  gold, 
and  yet  at  no  period  has  there  existed  a  greater  tendency  to  increase 
of  competition  for  the  sale  of  labor  than  at  present  —  the  two  cities  of 
New  York  and  Philadelphia,  alone,  presenting  to  our  view  hundreds  of 
thousands  of  persons  who  are  totally  unable  to  exchange  their  services  for 
the  money  with  which  to  purchase  food  and  clothing.  Is  it  not  clear, 
from  all  these  facts,  that  — 

First,  the  nearer  the  place  of  consumption  to  the  place  of  production, 
the  smaller  must  be  the  power  of  transporters  and  other  middlemen  to 
tax  consumers  and  producers,  and  the  greater  must  be  the  power  of  the 
men  who  labor  to  profit  by.  the  things  produced  ? 

Second,  that  the  more  close  the  approximation  of  consumers  and  pro- 
ducers, the  smaller  must  be  the  power  of  middlemen  to  create  fictitious 
credits,  to  be  used  in  furtherance  of  their  speculations  ? 

Third,  that  the  greater  the  power  of  the  men  who  labor,  and  the  larger 
their  reward,  the  greater  must  be  the  tendency  towards  that  steadiness 
in  the  societary  action,  in  the  perfection  of  which  you  yourself  would 
find  the  proof  of  "  infallible  wisdom  in  those  who  conduct  its  operations"  ? 

Fourth,  that  all  the  experiences  of  continental  Europe,  and  all  our 
own,  tend  to  prove  that  steadiness  is  most  found  in  those  countries,  and 
at  those  periods,  in  which  the  policy  pursued  is  that  protective  one  ad- 
vocated in  France  by  the  great  Colbert,  and  among  ourselves  by  Wash- 
ington, Franklin,  Hamilton,  Adams,  Jefferson,  and  their  successors,  down 
to  Jackson ;  and  least  in  all  of  those  in  which  the  policy  pursued  is  that 
advocated  by  the  British  school,  which  sees  in  cheap  labor  and  cheap 
raw  materials  the  surest  road  to  wealth  and  power  for  the  British  trader  ? 

Renewing  my  proposition  to  cause  your  answers  to  these  questions  to 
be  republished  to  the  extent  of  not  less  than  300,000  copies,  I  remain, 
my  dear  sir,  with  great  respect, 

Your  obedient  servant, 

HENRY  C.  CAREY. 
W.  C.  BRYANT,  ESQ. 

PHILADELPHIA,  January  3,  1860. 


12  FINANCIAL  CRISES: 


LETTER    THIRD. 

DEAR  SIR. — In  one  of  his  Mount  Vernon  Papers,  Mr.  Everett  in- 
forms his  readers,  that  — 

"The  distress  of  the  year  1857  was  produced  by  an  enemy  more  formidable 
than  hostile  armies ;  by  a  pestilence  more  deadly  than  fever  or  plague ;  by  a  visi- 
tation more  destructive  than  the  frosts  of  Spring  or  the  blights  of  Summer.  I 
believe  that  it  was  caused  by  a  mountain  load  of  DEBT.  The  whole  country,  in- 
dividuals and  communities,  trading-houses,  corporations,  towns,  cities,  States, 
•were  laboring  under  a  weight  of  debt,  beneath  which  the  ordinary  business  rela- 
tions of  the  country  were  at  length  arrested,  and  the  great  instrument  usually 
employed  for  carrying  them  on,  CREDIT,  broken  down." 

This  is  all  very  true  —  a  crisis  consisting  in  the  existence  of  heavy 
debts  requiring  to  be  paid  by  individuals,  banks,  and  governments,  at  a 
time  when  all  desire  to  be  paid,  and  few  or  none  are  able  to  make  the 
payments.  That  admitted,  however,  we  are  not,  so  far  as  I  can  see, 
much  nearer  than  we  were  before  to  such  explanation  of  the  causes  of 
crises,  as  is  required  for  enabling  us  to  determine  upon  the  mode  of 
preventing  the  recurrence  of  evils  so  frightful  as  are  those  you  have  so 
well  described.  Why  is  it,  that  our  people  are  so  much  more  burthened 
with  debt  than  are  their  competitors  in  Europe  ?  Why  is  it,  that  it  so 
frequently  occurs  among  ourselves  that  all  need  to  be  paid,  and  so  few 
are  able  to  pay  ?  Why  is  it,  that  crises  always  occur  in  free-trade  times  ? 
Why  is  it,  that  they  never  wcur  in  protective  times?  Why  is  it,  that 
it  so  frequently  occurs  that  those  who  are  rich  are  enabled  to  demand 
from  the  poor  settlers  of  the  West,  as  much  per  month,  in  the  form  of 
interest,  as  is  paid  per  year,  by  the  farmers  of  England,  France,  and  Ger- 
many? These  are  great  questions,  to  which  Mr.  Everett  has  furnished 
no  reply.  Let  us  have  them  answered,  and  we  shall  have  made  at  least 
one  step  toward  the  removal  of  the  evils  unde*r  which  our  people  so 
greatly  suffer. 

Let  us  try,  my  dear  sir,  if  you  and  I  cannot  do  that  which  Mr.  Eve- 
rett has  failed  to  do — ascertaining  the  cause  of  the  existence  of  so  much 
debt,  the  constant  preliminary  to  that  absence  of  confidence  which  impels 
all  to  seek  payment,  while  depriving  so  nearly  all  of  the  power  to  pay. 

The  commodity  that  you  and  I,  and  all  of  us,  have  to  sell,  is  labor  — 
human  effort,  physical  or  mental.  It  is  the  only  one  that  perishes  at  the 
moment  of  production,  and  that,  if  not  then  put  to  use,  is  lost  forever. 
The  man  who  does  put  it  to  use,  need  not  go  in  debt  for  the  food  and 
clothing  required  by  his  family;  but  he  who  does  not,  must  either  con- 
tract debt,  or  his  family  must  suffer  from  want  of  nourishment.  Such 
being  the  case,  the  necessity  for  the  creation  of  debt  should  diminish 
with  every  increase  in  that  competition  for  the  purchase  of  labor,  which 
.tends  to  produce  an  instant  demand  for  the  forces,  physical  or  mental, 
of  each  and  every  man  in  the  community  —  such  competition  resulting 
from  the  existence  of  a  power  on  the  part  of  each  and  every  other  man 
to  offer  something  valuable  in  exchange  for  it.  On  the  contrary,  it 


THEIR   CAUSES   AND   EFFECTS.  13 

should  increase  with  every  increase  in  the  competition  for  the  sale  of 
labor,  resulting  from  the  absence  of  demand  for  the  human  forces  that 
are  produced.  In  the  one  case,  men  are  tending  towards  freedom, 
whereas,  in  the  other,  they  are  tending  in  the  direction  of  slavery — the 
existence  of  almost  universal  debt  being  to  be  regarded  as  evidence  of 
growing  power,  on  the  part  of  those  who  are  already  rich,  to  control  the 
movements  of  those  who  need  to  live  by  the  sale  of  labor. 

Where,  now,  is  debt  most  universal  and  most  oppressive  ?  For  an 
answer  to  this  question,  let  me  beg  that  you  will  look  to  India,  where, 
since  the  annihilation  of  her  manufactures,  the  little  proprietor  has  almost 
disappeared,  to  be  replaced  by  the  wretched  tenant,  who  borrows  at  fifty, 
sixty,  or  a  hundred  per  cent,  per  annum,  the  little  seed  he  can  afford  to 
use,  and  finds  himself  at  last  driven  to  rebellion  by  the  continued  exac- 
tions of  the  money-lenders  and  the  government.  Turn,  next,  to  those 
parts  of  Russia  where  there  are  no  manufactures,  and  find  in  the  free- 
trade  book  of  M.  Tegoborski  his  statemeTil  of  the  fact,  that  where  there 
is  no  diversification  of  pursuits  the  condition  of  the  slave  is  preferable 
to  that  of  the  free  laborer.  Pass  thence  to  Turkey — finding  there  an 
universality  of  debt  that  is  nowhere  else  exceeded.  Look,  next,  to 
Mexico,  and  find  the  poor  laborer,  overwhelmed  with  debt,  passing  into 
servitude.  Pass  on  to  Ireland,  and  study  the  circumstances  which  pre- 
ceded the  expulsion,  or  starvation,  in  ten  short  years,  of  a  million  and 
a  half  of  free  white  people — that  expulsion  having  been  followed  by  the 
passage  of  an  Act  of  Parliament  for  expelling,  in  their  turn,  the  owners 
of  the  land  from  which  those  laborers  had  gone.  Look  where  you  may, 
you  will  see  that  it  is  in  those  communities  of  the  world  which  are  most 
limited  to  the  labors  of  the  field,  that  debt  is  most  universal,  and  that 
the  condition  of  the  people  is  most  akin  to  slavery  —  and  for  the  reason 
that  there  it  is,  that  there  is  least  competition  for  the  purchase  of  labor. 
There,  consequently,  there  is  the  greatest  waste  of  the  great  commodity 
which  all  of  us  must  sell,  if  we  would  have  the  means  of  purchase. 

Turn,  now,  if  you  please,  to  Central  and  Northern  Europe,  and  there 
you  will  find  a  wholly  different  picture  —  competition  for  the  purchase 
of  labor  being  there  steadily  on  the  increase,  with  constant  augmenta- 
tion of  the  rapidity  of  commerce  —  constant  increase  in  the  power  to 
economize  the  great  commodity  of  which  I  have  spoken — and,  as  a  ne- 
cessary consequence,  constant  diminution  in  the  necessity  for  the  con- 
traction of  debt.  Why  should  such  remarkable  differences  exist  ?  Be- 
cause, in  all  of  these  latter  countries,  the  whole  policy  of  the  country 
tends  towards  emancipation  from  the  British  free-trade  system,  whereas 
India,  Ireland,  Turkey,  and  Mexico,  are  becoming  from  day  to  day  more 
subject  to  it. 

Looking  homeward,  we  may  now,  my  dear  sir,  inquire  when  it  has 
been,  that  the  complaint  of  debt  has  been  most  severe.  Has  it  not  been 
in  those  awful  years  which,  followed  the  free-trade  speculations  of 
1816-17?  Has  it  not  been  in  that  terrific  period  which  followed  the 
free-trade  speculations  of  '37  to  '40  —  that  period  in  which  a  bankrupt 
law  was  forced  from  Congress,  as  the  only  means  of  enabling  tens  of 
thousands  of  industrious  men  to  enter  anew  upon  the  business  of  life  ? 
Has  it  not  been  in  the  years  of  the  present  free-trade  crisis,  which  pre- 
sent to  view  private  failures  of  almost  five  hundred  millions  in  amount  ? 


14  FINANCIAL  CRISES: 

When,  on  the  other  hand,  has  there  heen  least  complaint?  Has  it  not 
been  in  those  tranquil  years  which  followed  the  passage  of  the  protective 
tariffs  of  '28  and  '42  ?  That  it  has  been  so,  is  certain.  Why  should  it 
so  have  been  ?  Because  in  protective  times  every  man  has  found  a  pur- 
chaser for  his  labor,  and  has  been  thereby  relieved  from  all  necessity  for 
contracting  debt;  whereas,  in  free-trade  times,  a  large  portion  of  the  labor 
power  produced  has  remained  unemployed,  and  its  owners,  unable  to  sell 
their  one  commodity,  have  been  forced  to  choose  between  the  contraction 
of  debt  on  the  one  hand,  or  famine  and  death  on  the  other. 

Look  next,  my  dear  sir,  to  our  public  debt,  and  mark  its  extinction 
under  the  tariff  of  '28  —  its  revival  under  the  compromise  tariff — its 
reduction  under  that  of  '42 — and  then  study  the  present  situation  of  a 
national  treasury  that,  in  time  of  perfect  peace,  is  running  in  debt  at 
the  rate  of  little  less  than  $20,000,000  a-year ! 

Turn  then,  if  you  please,  to  our  debt  to  foreigners,  which  was  annihi- 
lated under  the  tariff  of  '28  swelled  to  hundreds  of  millions  under  the 
tariff  of  '33  —  and  since  so  much  enlarged,  under  the  tariffs  of  '46  and 
'57,  that  the  enormous  sum  of  $30,000,000  is  now  required  for  the  pay- 
ment of  its  annual  interest. 

France,  with  a  population  little  larger  than  our  own,  and  one  far  less 
instructed,  maintains  an  army  of  600,000  men  — -  carries  on  distant  wars 
— builds  magnificent  roads — enlarges  her  marine  and  fortifies  her  ports 
—  and  doe  all  these  things  with  so  much  ease,  that  when  the  govern- 
ment has  .Jdenly  occasion  for  $100,000,000,  the  whole  is  supplied 
at  home,  and  without  an  effort.  Belgium  and  Germany  follow  in  the 
same  direction  —  not  only  making  all  their  own  roads,  but  contributing 
largely  to  the  construction  of  those  which  are  used  for  carrying  out  the 
rude  products  of  our  land,  and  bringing  back  the  cloth,  the  paper,  and 
the  iron,  that  our  own  people,  now  unemployed,  would  gladly  make  at 
home.  They  are  rapidly  becoming  the  bankers  of  the  world,  for  they 
live  under  systems  e,ven  more  protective  than  were  those  of  our  tariffs 
of  '28  and  '42.  We,  on  the  contrary,  are  rapidly  becoming  the  great 
paupers  of  the  world  —  creating  seven,  eight,  and  ten  per  cent  bonds, 
and  then  selling  them  at  enormous  discounts,  to  pay  for  iron  so  poor  in 
quality  that  our  rails  depreciate  at  the  rate  of  five,  six,  and  even  ten  per 
cent  a-year. 

Looking  at  all  these  facts,  is  it  not  clear,  my  dear  sir  — 

That  the  necessity  for  the  contraction  of  debt  exists,  throughout  the 
world,  in  the  ratio  of  the  adoption  of  the  free-trade  system  of  which  you 
are  the  earnest  advocate  ? 

That  the  greater  the  necessity  for  the  contraction  of  debt,  the  greater 
is  the  liability  to  the  recurrence  of  commercial  crises  such  as  you  have 
so  well  described  ? 

That  the  more  frequent  the  crises,  the  greater  is  the  tendency  towardj 
the  subjection  of  the  laborer  to  the  will  of  his  employer,  and  towards 
the  creation  of  slavery  even  where  it  has  at  present  no  existence  ?  And, 
therefore  — 

That  it  is  the  bounden  duty  of  every  real  lover  of  freedom  to  labo: 
for  the  re-establishment  of  the  protective  system  among  ourselves  ? 


THEIR   CAUSES   AND   EFFECTS.  15 

At  foot*  is  given,  as  you  see,  your  notice  of  refusal  to  enter  upon  the 
discussion  to  which  you  have  been  invited.  For  a  reply  thereto,  permit 
me,  my  dear  sir,  to  refer  you  to  the  following  exposition  of  your  own 
views  in  relation  to  free  discussion,  given  by  yourself,  a  few  days  since, 
in  the  Evening  Post : 

"THOSE  POLITICAL  LECTURES. — As  our  readers  know,  a  project  has  been  under 
consideration  to  give  a  course  of  political  lectures  in  this  city  during  the  present 
winter,  and  in  which  our  prominent  politicians  of  all  parties  were  to  be  invited 
to  take  a  part.  We  now  understand  that  the  scheme  has  fallen  through,  mainly 
because  no  single  Denfocrat  could  be  found  who  was  willing  to  ventilate  his  party 
opinions,  and  maintain  them,  in  connection  with  a  series  of  similar  addresses  by 
Republican,  Radical,  and  American  speakers.  We  are  assured  that  of  twenty 
Northern  and  Southern  Democratic  statesmen,  who  have  been  invited,  not  one  has 
accepted  the  invitation.  It  is  proper  to  say  that  the  signatures  to  the  letter  in- 
viting speakers  represented  a  number  of  our  very  foremost  citizens,  of  all  shades 
of  politics.  If  a  letter,  so  respectably  signed  as  to  guarantee  every  courtesy  to 
all  who  took  part  in  the  course,  failed  to  secure  at  least  one  speaker  to  uphold 
Democratic  principles,  we  may  safely  suggest  that  the  old  soubriquet  of  the  "un- 
terrified  Democracy"  is  a  misnomer.  We  regret  the  failure  of  the  proposed 
course  of  lectures,  but  are  glad  to  know  that  many  Republicans  were  willing  to 
participate.  Why  cannot  we  have  a  few  Republican  speakers  in  an  independent 


Obviously,  these  Democrats  fear  discussion.  For  years,  they  have 
been  advocating  doctrines  that  will  not  bear  examination  before  the 
people.  What,  however,  shall  we  say  to  the  free-trade  advocates?  Is 
there  any  one  of  them  that  would  accept  a  proposition  like  to  the  one  to 
which  you  have  here  referred  ?  Would  they  even  accept  an  offer  that 
was  so  much  better  than  this,  that  it  would  give  them,  of  cool  and  reflect- 
ing readers,  Jive  hundred  times  as  many  as  you  could  give  to  any  Demo- 
crat, of  mere  auditors  ?  Would  Mr.  Hallock,  of  the  Journal  of  Com- 
merce, accept  the  magnificent  offer  I  have  made  to  you,  which,  thus  far, 
you  have  not  accepted  ?  Would  it  be  accepted  by  Mr.  Greene,  of  the 
Boston  Morning  Post?  Will  you  accept  it?  If  you  will  not,  can  you 
object  to  the  course  of  the  Democratic  leaders  to  whom  you  have  here 
referred  ?  Scarcely  so,  as  I  think. 

Hoping  to  hear  that  you  have  reconsidered  the  question,  and  have 
decided  to  accede  to  a  proposition  which  will  enable  you  to  address  to  a 
million  and  a  half  of  readers,  all  the  arguments  that  can  be  adduced  in 
support  of  free-trade  doctrines,  I  remain,  my  dear  sir, 

Very  truly  and  respectfully  yours, 

HENRY  C.  CAREY. 
W.  C.  BRYANT,  ESQ. 

PHILADELPHIA,  January  17,  1860. 

*  "MR.  CAREY'S  CHALLENGE.  —  Mr.  Henry  C.  Carey,  of  Philadelphia,  known 
by  various  works  on  political  economy,  has  challenged  Mr.  Bryant,  one  of  the 
editors  of  this  paper,  to  a  discussion,  in  the  newspapers,  of  the  question  of  cus- 
tom-house taxation.  In  behalf  of  Mr.  Bryant,  we  would  state  that  challenges  of 
this  kind  he  neither  gives  nor  accepts.  It  would  almost  seem  like  affectation  on 
his  part  to  say  that  he  has  not  read  the  letters  —  two  in  number,  he  is  told  —  in 
which  this  defiance  is  given  on  the  part  of  Mr.  Carey,  having,  unfortunately,  too 
little  curiosity  to  see  in  what  terms  it  is  expressed ;  but  as  such  is  the  fact,  it  is 
well  perhaps  to  mention  it.  His  duties  as  a  journalist,  and  a  commentator  on  the 
events  of  the  day  and  the  various  interesting  questions  which  they  suggest,  leave 


16  FINANCIAL  CRISES: 

him  no  time  for  a  sparring-match  with  Mr.  Carey,  to  which  the  public,  after  a  little 
while,  would  pay  no  attention ;  and  if  he  had  ever  so  much  time,  and  the  public 
were  ever  so  much  interested  in  what  he  had  to  say,  he  has  no  ambition  to  distin- 
guish himself  as  a  public  disputant.  His  business  is  to  enforce  what  he  considers 
important  political  truths,  and  refute  what  seem  to  him  errors,  just  as  the  occa- 
sions arise,  and  to  such  extent  as  he  imagines  himself  able  to  secure  the  attention 
of  those  who  read  this  journal*  and  He  will  not  turn  aside  from  this  course  to  tie 
himself  down  to  a  tedious  dispute  concerning  the  tariff  question  at  any  man's 
invitation. 

"  The  question  of  the  tariff  is  not  the  principal  controversy  of  the  day.  It  mny 
seem  so  to  Mr.  Carey,  who  is  suffering  under  a  sort  of  monomania,  but  the  public 
mind  is  occupied  just  now  with  matters  of  graver  import.  To  them  it  is  proper 
that  a  journalist  should  principally  address  himself,  until  they  are  disposed  of. 
He  may  make  occasional  skirmishes  in  other  fields  of  controversy,  but  here  is  the 
main  battle.  When  the  tariff  question  comes  up  again,  it  will  be  early  enough  to 
meet  it ;  and  even  then,  a  journalist  who  understands  Invocation  would  keep 
himself  free  to  meet  it  in  his  own  way. 

"If  Mr.  Carey  is  anxious  to  call  out  some  antagonist  with  whom  to  measure 
weapons  in  a  formal  combat,  and  can  find  nobody  who  has  an  equal  desire  with 
himself  to  shine  in  controversy,  we  can  recommend  to  him  a  person  with  whom  he 
can  tilt  to  his  heart's  content.  One  Henry  C.  Carey,  of  Philadelphia,  published, 
some  twenty  years  since,  a  work  in  three  volumes,  entitled  '  Principles  of  Political 
Economy,'  in  which  he  showed,  from  the  experience  of  all  the  world,  that  the 
welfare  of  a  country  is  dependent  on  its  freedom  of  trade,  and  that,  in  proportion 
as  its  commerce  is  emancipated  from  the  shackles  of  protection,  and  approaches 
absolute  freedom,  its  people  are  active,  thriving,  and  prosperous.  We  will  put 
forward  Henry  C.  Carey  as  the  champion  to  do  battle  with  Henry  C.  Carey.  This 
gentleman,  who  is  now  so  full  of  fight,  will  have  ample  work  on  his  hands  in  de- 
molishing the  positions  of  his  adversary,  with  which  he  has  the  great  advantage 
of  being  already  perfectly  familiar.  When  that  is  done,  which  will  take  three  or 
four  years  at  the  least,  inasmuch  as  both  the  disputants  are  voluminous  writers, 
we  would  suggest  that  he  give  immediate  notice  to  his  associates,  the  owners  of 
the  Pennsylvania  iron-mills,  who  will  doubtless  lose  no  time  in  erecting  a  cast-iron 
statue  in  honor  of  the  victor." 


THEIR   CAUSES   AND   EFFECTS. 


LETTER   FOURTH. 

DEAR  SIR. — In  the  notjce  of  your  refusal  to  enter  upon  the  discus- 
sion to  which  you  have  been  invited,  it  is  said  that  you  "  had  not  read 
the  letters"  that  had  been  addressed  to  you.  That  such  had  been  the 
case,  is  not  at  all  improbable ;  but  how  far  a  great  public  teacher,  as 
you  undoubtedly  are,  can  be  heW  justified  in  closing  his  eyes  when 
invited  to  a  calm  examination  of  the  question  whether  his  teachings  tend 
in  the  direction  of  prosperity  and  freedom  for  the  laborer,  on  the  one 
hand,  or  toward  pauperism  and  slavery  on  the  other,  seems  to  me  to  be 
far  less  certain.  Placed  myself  in  his  situation,  I  should  regard  it  as 
one  of  great  responsibility  —  one  in  which  erroneous  action,  resulting 
from  failure  to  give  to  the  subject  the  fullest  and  fairest  examination, 
would  be  little  short  of  the  wilful  and  deliberate  commission  of  crime. 
That  you  agree  with  me  in  this,  I  cannot,  even  for  a  moment,  doubt. 

That  you  had  not  read  the  notice  served  upon  me,  I  regard  as  abso- 
lutejy  certain,  and  for  the  reason,  that  its  tone  and  manner  are  entirely 
unworthy  of  you,  and  you  would  not,  I  am  sure,  permit  anything  to  be 
said  by  others  for  you,  that  you  would  not  say  yourself.  Further,  you 
are  there  placed  in  the  false  position  of  doing  what  I  know  you  would 
not  do — shrinking  from  responsibility,  by  permitting  yourself  to  be  pre- 
sented to  the  world  as  being  only  "  one  of  the  editors  "  of  the  Post,  in- 
stead of  the  editor,  as  you  are  so  well  known  to  be.  Mr.  G-reeley  is  the 
editor  of  his, paper,  and,  as  such,  endorses  the  opinions,  given  editorially, 
of  the  many  gentlemen  by  whom  he  is  aided.  So,  too,  is  it  with  your- 
self; and  the  rule  of  looking  to  the  endorser  when  the  drawer  cannot 
be  found,  applies  in  this  case  as  fully  as  it  can  do  in  that  of  a  promis- 
sory note.  So  far  as  I  can  recollect,  the  editor  of  the  Tribune  has  never 
shrunk  from  any  such  responsibility  —  having  repeatedly  replied,  over 
his  own  signature,  to  papers  addressed  to  himself  in  reference  to  editorials 
that  he  had  published.  Quite  sure  I  am,  that  were  you  now  to  cite  him 
before  the  world,  as  I  have  cited  you,  demanding  an  examination  of  the 
principles  upon  which  he  had  based  his  advocacy  of  protection,  he  would 
most  gladly  meet  you  —  giving  to  all  you  had  to  say  the  benefit  of  his 
enormous  circulation,  and  leaving  his  readers  to  decide  for  themselves, 
after  calm  perusal  of  your  arguments.  Like  you,  he  might  find  it  quite 
impossible  to  give  to  the  question  all  the  attention  it  might  demand,  but, 
in  that  case,  he  would,  most  assuredly,  find  some  one  to  take  his  place — 
becoming  responsible,  as  editor,  as  fully  as  if  he  alone  had  written.  Like 
him,  you  are  surrounded  by  persons  who  have  treated  this  subject  on  hun- 
dreds, if  not  even  thousands,  of  occasions — you  making  yourself  respon- 
sible for  all  they  have  thus  far  said ;  and  I  am,  therefore,  at  a  loss  to  un- 
derstand why  you  should  now  fail  to  profit  by  the  admirable  opportunity 
offered  you,  for  establishing  the  truth  of  free-trade  doctrines.  Can  it  be, 
that  their  advocates  dare  not  meet  the  question  ?  If  so,  are  they  not 
now  placing  themselves  in  a  situation  precisely  similar  to  that  so  recently 
described  by  you,  in  speaking  of  your  Democratic  opponents  ? 


18  FINANCIAL  CRISES: 

I  am  told,  however,  that  this  is  not  the  principal  question  of  the  day. 
tt  may  not  be  so  with  the  people  of  your  city,  but  you  would  greatly  err, 
were  you  to  suppose  that  such  was  the  case  with  those  of  the  States 
south  and  west  of  you,  and  north  of  Mason  and  Dixon's  line.  In  this 
State  and  Jersey,  it  is  the  one,  and  almost  the  only  question.  In  Ohio, 
a  large' majority  of  the  Republican  senators  are  stated  to  have  announced 
their  distinct  intention  to  make  it  the  question.  In  Illinois,  the  most 
influential  of  all  the  Republican  journals  of  the  State  has  entirely  aban- 
doned the  free-trade  doctrines — giving  itself  now  to  the  advocacy  of  pro- 
tection. Throughout  the  West,  the  question  of  the  adoption  of  measures 
required  for  the  creation  of  domestic  markets,  and  for  the  emancipation 
of  the  country  from  the  control  of  British  manufacturers,  is  rapidly 
taking  the  place  heretofore  so  exclusively  occupied  by  the  anti-slavery 
one.  All  of  these  people  may  be  wrong,  and,  if  so,  they  should  be  set 
right.  That  they  may  be  so,  I  have  offered  you  the  use  of  the  columns 
of  protectionist  journals,  circulating,  to  the  extent  of  hundreds  of  thou- 
sands of  copies,  among  the  very  persons  who  are  thus  in  error.  That 
great  offer  it  is  that,  thus  far,  you  have  not  accepted. 

The  great  question  of  the  day,  in  your  estimation,  is  that  of  slavery 
and  freedom,  and  in  this  we  are  entirely  agreed.  How  is  it  that  men 
may  be  made  more  free?  That  is  the  question,  and  it  must  be  answered 
before  we  can  venture  upon  action,  unless  we  are  willing  to  incur  the 
risk  of  promoting  the  growth  of  slavery,  while  really  desiring  to  advance 
the  cause  of  freedom.  All  experience  shows,  that  men  have  become 
more  free  as  they  have  been  more  and  more  enabled  to  work  in  combina- 
tion with  each  other,  and  that  the  power  of  combination  grows  as  em- 
ployments become-  more  diversified — slavery,  on  the  other  hand,  growing 
in  all  those  countries  in  which  men  are  becoming  more  and  more  limited 
to  the  labors  of  the  field.  Such  being  the  case,  that  policy  which  tends 
to  produce  diversification  and  combination  should  be  the  one  which  would 
lead  to  freedom.  Which  of  the  two  is  it,  protection  or  free  trade,  which 
tends  in  that  direction  ?  For  an  answer  to  this  question,  we  need  but 
look  to  Northern  and  Central  Europe  —  finding  there  the  protective  sys- 
tem in  full  vigor,  and  the  people  rapidly  advancing  in  wealth,  strength, 
freedom,  and  power.  The  opposite,  or  free-trade  system,  has  been  in 
active  operation  in  India,  Ireland,  Turkey,  and  other  countries,  whose 
people  are  as  rapidly  declining  towards  poverty,  slavery,  and  general 
demoralization. 

How,  my  dear  sir,  has  it  been  among  ourselves  ?  Turn  to  the  years 
which  followed  the  abandonment  of  the  protective  policy  in  1816,  and 
study  the  rapid  growth  of  pauperism  and  wretchedness  that  was  then  ob- 
served. Pass  on  to  those  which  followed  the  passage  of  the  protec- 
tive tariffs  of  1824  and  1828,  and  remark  the  wonderful  change  towards 
wealth  and  freedom  that  was  at  once  produced.  Study  next  the  growth  of 
pauperism  and  destitution  under  the  compromise  tariff,  closing  with  the 
almost  entire  paralysis  of  1840-42.  Pass  onward,  and  examine  the  action 
of  the  tariff  of  1842  —  remarking  the  constant  increase  in  the  demand 
for  labor — in  the  production  and  consumption  of  iron,  and  of  cotton  and 
woollen  goods  —  and  in  the  strength  and  power  of  a  community  which 
had  so  recently  been  obliged  to  apply,  and  that  in  vain,  at  all  the  bank- 
ing houses  of  Europe,  for  the  small  amount  of  money  that  then  was 


THEIR   CAUSES   AND   EFFECTS.  19 

needed  for  carrying  on  the  government.  Look,  next,  to  the  repeated 
crises  we  have  had  under  the  tariffs  of  1846  and  1857 — each  and  all  of 
them  tending  toward  strengthening  the  rich,  while  weakening  the  poor, 
and  promoting  a  growth  of  pauperism  such  as  has  never,  I  believe,  been 
known,  in  any  country  of  the  civilized  world,  to  be  accomplished  in  so 
brief  a  period.  Such  having  been  the  result,  the  questions  now  arise, 
—  Whither  are  we  tending?  Is  it  not  toward  slavery  for  the  white 
laborer '(  Those  are  the  questions  I  have  desired  to  have  discussed,  and 
whatever  you,  my  dear  sir,  may  think  of  it^they  must  be  always  in  order. 
These,  however,  as  may  be  said,  are  mere  facts  —  a  sort  of  political 
arithmetic.  Trade  should  be  free,  and  any  facts  that  may  be  produced 

in  opposition  to  that  theory,  must  be  such  as  cannot  be  relied  on That 

'  we  should  be  always  going  in  the  direction  of  freedom  of  commerce,  and 
freedom  of  man,  I  fully  and  freely  admit;  but  what  is  the  road  which 
leads  in  that  direction  ?  Certainly,  not  the  one  on  which  we  recently 
have  travelled  —  all  our  present  tendencies  being  toward  pauperism  and 
slavery,  for  the  white  man  and  the  black.  As  certainly,  it  is  the  one  on 
which  we  travelled  in  the  years  of  the  period  of  the  tariffs  of  1828  and 
1842 ;  and  if  you  desire  any  evidence  of  this,  you  have  but  to  look  to 
the  most  distinguished  free-trade  writers  of  the  present  century — their 
teachings  and  mine  being  in  full  accordance  with  each  other. 

Seeking  proof  of  this  assertion,  allow  me,  my  dear  sir,  to  request 
that  you  will  turn  to  Mr.  J.  B.  Say,  and  study  the  cases  described  by 
him  as  being  those  in  which  "protection,  granted  with  a  view  to  promote 
the  profitable  application  of  labor  and  capital,  may  become  productive 
of  universal  benefit."  Look  next,  if  you  please,  to  Mons.  Blanqui,  his 
successor,  and  find  him  assuring  his  readers  that "  experience  had  already 
taught,  that  a  people  ought  neve*  to  deliver  over  to  the  chances  of  a 
foreign  trade,  the  fate  of  its  manufactures."  Pass  on  to  Mons.  Rossi, 
and  read  his  entire  disclaimer  of  the  idea  of  non-intervention  by  the 
government — holding,  as  he  does,  that  "  a  prudent  and  enlightened  ad- 
ministration requires  the  making,  in  view  of  probable  future  benefit,  of 
advances  that  may  not,  possibly,  be  repaid  in  full."  Turn  thence  to 
Mr.  J.  S.  Mill,  who  tells  his  readers,  that  "  the  superiority  of  one  coun- 
try over  another,  in  any  branch  of  production,  often  arises  only  from 
having  begun  it  sooner,  and  that  a  country  which  has  skill  and  expe- 
rience yet  to  acquir3,  may,  in  other  respects,  be  better  adapted  to  the 
production  than  others  that  were  earlier  in  the  field;"  but,  that  "it 
cannot  be  expected  that  individuals  should,  at  their  own  risk,  or,  rather, 
at  their  certain  loss,  introduce  a  new  manufacture,  and  bear  the  burthen 
of  carrying  it  on,  until  the  producers  have  been  educated  up  to  the 
level  of  those  with  whom  the  processes  have  become  traditional."  Look 
next  to  Mons.  Chevalier,  and  learn  that  not  onl}r  "  it  is  not  an  abuse  of 
power  on  the  part  of  the  government,"  but  that  "  it  is  only  the  accom- 
plishment of  a  positive  duty,  so  to  act  at  each  epoch  in  the  progress  of 
a  nation,  as  to  favor  the  taking  possession  of  all  the  branches  of  industry 
whose  acquisition  is  authorized  by  the  nature  of  things."  The  govern- 
ment which  fails  to  do  this,  "  makes,"  as  he  thinks,  "  a  great  mistake." 

You  have  here,  my  dear  sir,  the  views  of  five  of  the  most  eminent 
European  economists  of  the  present  century — all  of  them  high  authori- 
ties in  the  free-trade  school,  and  yet  all  concurring  in  the  views  I  have 


20  FINANCIAL  CRISES: 

expressed  to  you.  Facts  and  theories  being  thus  in  opposition  to  your 
doctrines,  is  it  not  time  that  you  should  undertake  anew  the  examina- 
tion of  the  question,  with  a  view  to  satisfy  yourself  whether  the  teach- 
ings of  the  Post  are  really  those  of  slavery  or  of  freedom  ? 

I  am  told  that  I  was  once  a  free-trader,  and  nothing  can  be  more  true. 
Careful  study  of  the  phenomena -of  the  free-trade  convulsion  of  1840- 
42,  and  of  the  protectionist  revival  of  1842-47,  having,  however,  satis- 
fied me  that  that  the  facts  and  the  theory  could  not  agree,  I  was  led 
to  study  anew  the  latter,  and  find  the  cause  of  error.  That  found, 
I  felt  no  more  difficulty  in  admitting  that  I  had  been  wrong,  than  would 
be  felt  by  yourself,  after  you  should  have  tried,  and  vainly  tried,  to 
establish  the  fact,  that  the  cause  of  freedom  was  to  be  promoted  by  a 
policy  that  separated  the  producer  from  the  consumer  —  placing  the 
spindle  and  the  loom  on  one  continent,  and  leaving  the  plough  and  the 
harrow  on  the  other. 

At  the  moment  of  inviting  you  to  join  with  me  in  an  inquiry  as  to 
the  real  road  towards  wealth  and  freedom  for  our  people,  harmony  for 
our  Union,  and  prosperity  and  power  for  our  great  Confederacy  —  that 
inquiry  to  be  conducted  in  the  spirit  of  men  who  sought  for  truth,  and 
not  for  victory  —  I  had  still  some  lingering  doubts  of  your  acceptance ; 
and  yet,  it  appeared  to  me  that  you  yourself  should  be  quite  as  anxious 
for  it  as  I,  by  any  possibility,  could  be. — Desirous  to  remove  all  difficulty, 
the  space  to  be  given  was  left  to  your  decision  —  the  greatness  of  the 
subject  seeming  to  me  to  give  assurance  that  the  inquiry  would  be  allowed 
to  assume  proportions  somewhat  in  accordance  with  those  of  the  interests 
to  be  discussed.  Pledged,  as  we  should  be,  to  the  cause  of  truth,  and  to 
that  alone,  any  previous  involvements,  on  either  side,  would  shrink  into 
utter  insignificance.  Neither  of  us,  as  it  seemed  to  me,  need  be  so  anxious 
to  shine  in  the  dispute  as  to  hesitate  at  any  risk  that  we,  as 'individuals, 
might  run — pledged  as  we  were,  by  all  our  past  history,  to  give  to  this  one 
great  question,  the  most  frank  and  candid  examination. 

Regretting  that  you  have  not,  thus  far,  been  able  to  agree  with  me  in 
the  view  that  has  been  here  presented,  but  hoping  that  you  may  yet  do 
BO,  I  remain,  with  great  respect, 

Yours,  very  truly, 

HENRY  C.  CAREY. 
W.  C.  BETANT,  ESQ. 

PHILADELPHIA,  January  24,  1859. 


THEIR   CAUSES   AND   EFFECTS.  21 


LETTER    FIFTH. 

DEAR  SIR.  —  A  fortnight  since,  you  stated,  on  the  authority  of  Dr. 
Wynne,  that  pauperism  in  the  State  of  New  York  had  assumed  propor- 
tions relatively  greater  than  those  of  England  or  of  Scotland,  and  "  largely 
in  advance"  of  even  the  downtrodden  and  unhappy  Ireland — your  per- 
centage being  as  high  as  7.40,  or  more  than  double  that  of  all  the  Bri- 
tish Islands.  When  these  facts  were  first  presented  to  your  sanitary 
society,  they  appeared  to  the  managers  "  so  startling  as  to  lead  them  to 
doubt  their  accuracy,  but,"  as  you  now  have  told  your  readers,  "  after 
the  most  careful  scrutiny,  they  have  not  only  adopted  them,  but  giveri 
them  currency  as  authority  in  their  report."  This  "  condition  of  facts" 
is  one  that,  as  you  think,  "  calls  for  investigation  by  the  proper  authori- 
ties "  —  the  alarming  facts  being  presented  for  their  consideration,  that 
no  less  than  forty-one  per  cent  of  the  paupers  are  native  born,  and  that 
the  terrible  disease  of  pauperism  appears,  "  like  the  Canadian  thistle,  to 
have  settled  on  our  soil,  and  to  have  germinated  with  such  vigor  as,"  in 
your  opinion,  "  to  defy  all  half  measures  to  eradicate  it." 

The  pauper  is  necessarily  a  slave  to  those  who  feed  and  clothe  him, 
and  a  slave,  too,  more  abject,  as  a  general  rule,  than  are  even  the  negroes 
of  the  South.  White  slavery  thus  grows  steadily  —  furnishing  good 
reason  for  the  fears  that  you  have  here  expressed.  Equal  cause  for  such 
alarm  may  be  found,  however,  in  the  fact  that  the  growth  in  the  number 
and  power  of  your  millionaires  keeps  even  pace  therewith — growing  ine- 
quality of  condition  here  furnishing  conclusive  proof  of  decline  in  civi- 
lization and  in  freedom.  How  is  it  that  such  effects  are  being  produced? 
Here  is  a  great  question,  the  solution  of  which  may,  as  I  think  you  will 
agree  w,ith  me,  be  found  in  the  following  frightful  facts,  which  have  just 
now  been  given  to  the  world,  and  which  reveal  a  state  of  things  well 
calculated  to  carry  the  alarm  of  which  you  speak,  into  the  breast  of  every 
man  who  takes  an  interest  in  our  future. 

In  your  city  there  are  560  tenement  houses,  containing,  by  actual 
enumeration,  10,933  families,  or  about  65  persons  each;  193  with  111 
each;  71  others,  with  140  each;  and,  finally,  29,  that,  as  we  are  told, 
are  the-  most  profitable,  and  that  have  a  total  population  of  no  less  than 
5449  souls,  or  187  to  each.  What  are  the  accommodations  therein  pro- 
vided for  the  wretched  occupants,  is  shown  in  the  following  picture : 

"One  of  the  largest  and  most  recently  built  of  the  New  York  'barracks'  has 
apartments  for  126  families.  It  was  built  especially  for  this  use.  It  stands  on  a 
lot  50  by  250  feet,  is  entered  at  the  sides  from  alleys  eight  feet  wide,  and,  by 
reason  of  the  vicinity  of  another  barrack  of  equal  height,  the  rooms  are  so  dark- 
ened that  on  a  cloudy  day  it  is  impossible  to  read  or  sew  in  them  without  artificial 
light.  It  has  not  one  room  which  can  in  any  way  be  thoroughly  ventilated.  The 
vaults  and  sewers  which  are  to  entry  off  the  filth  of  the  126  families  have  grated 
openings  in  the  alleys,  and  doorways  in  the  cellars,  through  which  the  noisome 
and  deadly  miasmata  penetrate  and  poison  the  dank  air  of  the  house  and  the 
courts.  The  water-closets  for  the  whole  vast  establishment  are  a  range  of  stalls 


22  FINANCIAL   CRISES  : 

without  doors,  and  accessible  not  only  from  the  building,  but  even  from  the  street. 
Comfort  is  here  out  of  the  question ;  common  decency  has  been  rendered  impos- 
sible ;  and  the  horrible  brutalities  of  the  passenger-ship  are  day  after  day  repeated, 
—  but  on  a  larger  scale.  And  yet,  this  is  a  fair  specimen.  And  for  such  hideous 
and  necessarily  demoralizing  habitations, — for  two  rooms,  stench,  indecency,  and 
gloom,  the  poor  family  pays  —  and  the  rich  builder  receives — 'thirty-five  per  cent 
annually  on  the  eott  of  the  apartments!'  " 

We  have  here  the  type  of  the  system  that  is  now  more  and  more  ob- 
taining throughout  the  country.  One  financial  convulsion  follows  an- 
other, each  in  its  turn  closing  mills,  mines,  and  furnaces,  and  thus 
destroying  internal  commerce.^  With  every  step  in  that  direction,  our 
people  are  more  compelled  to  seek  the  cities,  and  thereby  augmenting  the 
power  of  the  rich  to  demand  enormous  rents,  usurious  interest,  and 
enormous  prices  for  lots — their  fortunes  growing  rapidly,  while  reducing 
thousands,  and  tens  of  thousands,  to  a  state  of  pauperism  and  destitution. 

Is  it,  however,  among  the  occupants  of  tenement  houses,  alone,  that 
we  are  to  find  the  facts  which  indicate  the  decline  to  which  I  have  re- 
ferred —  a  decline  which  must  be  arrested,  if  we  desire  not  to  find  the 
end  of  our  great  republic  is  anarchy  and  despotism  ?  Look  around  you, 
and  you  will  see  that  while  our  population  is  growing  at  the  rate  of  a 
million  a-year,  there  is  a  daily  diminution  in  the  demand  for  skilled  labor 
to  be  applied  to  the  conversion  of  raw  materials  into  finished  commodi- 
ties —  a  daily  diminution  of  that  confidence  in  the  future  which  is  re- 
quired for  producing  applications  of  capital  to  the  development  of  our 
great  natural  resources  —  a  daily  increase  in  the  necessity  for  looking 
to  trade  as  the  only  means  of  obtaining  a  support  —  and  a  consequent 
increase  in  the  proportions  borne  by  mere  middlemen  to  producers, 
causing  increased  demand  for  shops,  and  stores,  and  offices,  in  great 
cities,  and  enabling  landlords  to  demand  the  enormous  rents  which  now 
are  paid.  The  poor  tenant  slaves  and  starves,  and  finds  himself  at 
length  driven  to  bankruptcy  because  his  profits,  after  his  rent  is  paid, 
are,not  enough  to  enable  him  to  feed  and  clothe  his  wife  and  children 
— he  and  they  being  then  driven  to  seek  refuge  in  a  "  tenement  house," 
there  to  pay  a  rent  that  enables  its  rich  owner  to  double  his  capital  in 
almost  every  other  year.  The  rich  are  thus  made  richer,  while  pauper- 
ism and  crime  advance  with  the  gigantic  strides  you  have  described. 

Is  it,  however,  in  your  city  alone  that  facts  like  these  present  them- 
selves to  view  ?  That  such  is  not  the  case,  is  shown  in  the  following 
accurate  sketch  of  the  Philadelphia  movement  in  the  same  direction, 
given,  a  few  days  since,  by  your  neighbors  of  the  Tribune : 

"Poverty  has  reached  higher  places  in  society  thnn  the  habitually  destitute. 
Want  of  employment  with  many,  and  reduced  wages  with  others,  all  growing  out 
of  the  warfare  of  the  government  on  the  industry  of  the  country,  have  made  the 
present  season  one  of  peculiar  hardship  and  suffering.  Honest  labor  goes  without 
its  loaf,  because  no  one  can  afford  to  employ  it.  Persons  formerly  able  to  support 
themselves  decently,  are  now  crowding  for  relief  to  our  benevolent  institutions. 
The  visitors  of  the  latter  say  there  is  more  suffering  now  than  ever  before  known. 
Clothing,  food,  and  fuel  are  daily  given  in  large  amounts,  and  yet  the  cry  of  dis- 
tress continues.  The  soup-houses  have  been  compelled  to  reopen,  and  the  cha- 
ritable are  taxed  to  the  utmost.  These  suffering  thousands  are  the  victims  of  the 
scandalous  misgovernment  which  has  palsied  the  energies  of  so  many  branches 
•  of  industry.  They  would  gladly  earn  their  bread,  if  permitted  to  do  so." 


THEIR   CAUSES   AND   EFFECTS.  23 

All  this  is  strictly  true,  and  it  would,  as  I  think,  be  equally  so  if  said 
of  any  other  city  of  the  Union  —  the  whole  presenting  a  picture  of  en- 
forced idleness  such  as  is  not,  at  this  moment^  to  be  paralleled  in  any 
country  claiming  to  rank  as  civilized.  Pass  next,  if  you  please,  outward 
from  our  cities,  and  look  to  the  towns  and  villages  of  your  own  and 
other  States  —  marking  the  fact,  that  the  power  of  local  combination  is 
steadily  diminishing,  and  that  a  majority  of  them  have  either  become 
stationary,  or  have  retrograded.  Go  almost  where  you  may,  you  will  find 
that  the  internal  commerce  of  the  country  is  gradually  declining  —  that 
the  services  of  mechanics  are  meeting  less  and  less  demand  —  that  the 
dependence  on  great  cities  is  increasing  in  the  same  proportion  that  those 
cities  are  themselves  becoming  more  dependent  upon  Liverpool  and 
Manchester — and  that,  as  a  necessary  consequence,  pauperism  and  crime 
are  everywhere  assuming  proportions  so  gigantic  as  well  to  warrant  you 
in  the  assertion  that  their  growth  is  now  so  vigorous  as  to  bid  defiance  to 
"all  half  measures  of  eradication." 

How  may  they  be  eradicated  ?  This  is  a  great  question ;  but  to  find 
the  answer  to  it,  we  must  first  inquire  to  what  it  is  that  such  a  growth 
is  due.  Doing  this,  we  find  that  the  facts  of  the  present  day  are  in 
strict  accordance  with  those  observed  in  the  years  which  followed  the 
terrible  free-trade  crises  of  1818-20  and  1837-40,  as  well  as  with  those 
observed  in  Ireland,  India,  and  all  other  countries  subject  to  the  British 
free-trade  system.  Looking  next  to  the  periods  which  followed  the  pas- 
sage of  the  protective  acts  of  1828  and  1842,  we  find  directly  the  reverse 
of  this — pauperism  then  steadily  declining,  and  the  morals  of  the  com- 
munity improving  as  the  societary  movement  became  more  regular.  Turn- 
ing thence  toward  Northern  and  Central  Europe  —  toward  that  portion 
of  the  Eastern  world  which  steadily  resists  the  exhaustive  British  sys- 
tem —  we  find  phenomena  corresponding  precisely  with  those  observed 
in  our  own  protective  periods — the  demand  for  human  service  becoming 
more  and  more  regular  in  France  and  Germany,  and  the  reward  of  labor 
growing  with  a  steadiness  that  has  rarely,  if  ever,  been  exceeded. — Such 
being  the  facts,  is  it  not  clear,  my  dear  sir,  that  it  is  to  the  readoption 
of  the  protective  policy  v  e  must  look  for  effectual  "  measures  of  eradi- 
cation." Believe  me,  nothing  short  of  this  will  do. 

The  readers  of  the  Journal  of  Commerce  have  lately  been  assured 
"  thpt  our  institutions  nurture  the  evils  in  question."  Were  that  really 
the  case,  the  evil  wotild  be  so  radical  in  character,  that  nothing  short  of 
revolution  could  produce  the  change  desired.  That,  happily,  it  is  not 
eo,  you  will,  I  think,  be  well  assured,  when  you  shall  have  reflected  that 
all  our  institutions  find  their  foundation  in  local  development,  tending 
to  the  creation  of  thriving  towns  and  villages  in  the  neighborhood  of 
our  vast  deposits  of  coal  and  lead,  copper,  zinc,  and  iron — there  making 
a  market  for  the  products  of  agriculture,  and  giving  occasion  to  the 
improvement  of  our  great  water  powers,  to  be  used  in  the  conversion 
of  food  and  wool  into  cloth,  and  food,  coal,  and  ore,  into  knives  and 
axes,  steam-engines  and  railroad  bars.  —  What  now  is  the  object  for 
whose  attainment  our  people  seek  protection  ?  Is  it  not  this  very  local- 
ization in  which  alone  our  institutions  find  their  base  ?  That  such  is  the 
case  is  beyond  all  question,  anfl  therefore  is  it,  that  confidence  in  those 


24  FINANCIAL  CRISES: 

institutions  grows  in  every  period  of  protection  —  pauperism  and  crime 
then  declining  in  their  proportions  with  each  successive  hour. 

What,  on  the  contrary,  are  the  tendencies  of  the  British  free-trade 
system  ?  Do  not,  under  it,  towns  and  villages  decline,  while  great  cities 
grow  in  size?  Under  it,  does  not  internal  commerce  die  away?  Do  not 
crises  become  more  frequent  and  more  severe  ?  Does  not  paralysis  take 
the  place  of  that  healthy  action  which  is  indicative  of  strong  and  vigor- 
ous life  ?  Do  not  pauperism  and  immorality  grow  with  the  growth  you 
have  so  well  described  ?  Does  not  confidence  in  the  utility  and  perma- 
nence of  our  institutions  diminish  with  each  successive  year?  To  all 
these  questions,  the  answers  must  be  in  the  affirmative — such  phenomena 
having  presented  themselves  at  the  close  of  every  free-trade  period,  and 
the  only  difference  between  the  present-  and  the  past  being,  that  the 
current  one  has  been  so  much  longer,  and  that  the  disease  has,  therefore, 
become  by  far  more  virulent. 

Looking  at  all  these  facts,  is  it  not  clear,  my  dear  sir  — 

That  the  cause  of  disease  is  not  to  be  found  in  the  character  of  our 
institutions  ? 

That,  on  the  contrary,  it  is  to  be  found  in  the  pursuit  of  a  policy  that 
is  at  war  with  those  institutions,  and  threatens  their  destruction  ? 

That  the  remedy  of  which  you  are  in  search,  is  to  be  found  in  the 
readoption  of  the  policy  of  protection,  under  which  the  country  so  much 
prospered  in  the  periods  closing  with  1834  and  1847? 

That  in  default  of  the  adoption  of  this  remedy,  our  institutions  must 
decay  and  disappear  ? 

That  every  real  friend  of  freedom  should  aid  in  the  effort  to  rescue 
his  countrymen  from  the  grasp  of  foreign  traders  in  which  they  are 
now  held  ? 

That  every  movement  in  that  direction  must  tend  toward  diminution 
in  the  quantity  of  wretchedness  and  crime  ?  And,  therefore, 

That  all  who  oppose  such  action  —  teaching  British  free-trade  doc- 
trines—  are  thereby  making  themselves  responsible,  before  God  and 
man,  for  the  demoralization  above  described  ? 

Repeating,  once  again,  my  offer  to  place  your  replies  to  these  ques- 
tions within  the  reach  of  a  million  and  a  half  of  protectionist  readers, 
I  remain,  my  dear  sir, 

Very  respectfully,  your  obedient  servant, 

HENRY  C.  CAREY. 
W.  C.  BETANT,  ESQ. 

PHILADELPHIA,  January  81,  1860. 


THEIR   CAUSES   AND   EFFECTS.  25 


LETTER    SIXTH. 

DEAR  SIR.  —  Pauperism,  slavery,  and  crime,  as,you  have  seen,  fol- 
low everywhere  in  the  train  of  the  British  free-trade  system,  of  which 
you  have  been  so  long  the  earnest  advocate.  On  the  contrary,  they 
diminish  everywhere,  and  at  all  periods,- when,  in  accordance  with  the 
advice  of  the  most  eminent  European  economists,  that  system  is  effect- 
ually resisted.  We,  ourselves,  are  now  in  the  fourteenth  year  of  a  free- 
trade  period  —  the  result  exhibiting  itself,  as  you  yourself  so  recently 
have  shown,  in  a  growth  of .  all  that  has  at  length  most  seriously 
alarmed  the  very  men  to  whose  unceasing  efforts  that  growth  is  due. 
That  they  should  be  so  is  not  extraordinary,  but  their  alarm  would  be 
much  increased  were  they  now  to  study  carefully  the  condition  of  affairs 
at  the  end  of  the  peaceful  and  quiet  period  of  protection  which  closed 
with  1847,  and  then  contrast  with  it  the  state  at  which  we  have  arrived 
—  following  up  the  examination  by  asking  themselves  the  question  — 
Whither  are  we  tending?  —  and  seeking  to  find  an  answer  to  it.  The 
picture  that  would  then  present  itself  to  view,  would  so  much  shock 
them,  that  they  would  shrink  back  horrified  at  the  idea  of  the  fearful 
amount  of  responsibility  they,  thus  far,  had  incurred. 

That  the  facts  are  such  as  you  have  described  them,  cannot  be  denied. 
Do  they,  however,  flow  necessarily  from  submission  to  the  British  sys- 
tem, miscalled  by  its  advocates  the  free-trade  one — that  one  which  seeks 
to  limit  all  the  nations  of  the  world,  outside  of  England,  to  the  use  of 
the  plough  and  the  harrow,  and  to  a  single  market,  that  of  England,  for 
an  outlet  for  their  products  ?  That  they  do  so,  you  will,  I  am  sure,  be 
ready  to  admit,  after  having  reflected  that  men  become  rich,  free,  strpng, 
and  moral,  in  the  ratio  of  their  power  to  associate  and  combine  together, 
and  that  the  object  of  the  British  system,  for  more  than  a  century  past, 
has  been-  that  of  preventing  combination,  by  frustrating  every  attempt 
at  the  production  of  that  diversification  of  pursuits,  without  which  the 
power  of  association  can  have  little  or  no  existence. 

What  was  the  system  before  the  Revolution,  and  what  were  the  meu 
sures  recommended  as  being  those  most  likely  to  promote  the  retention 
of  the  colonists  in  their  then  existing  state  of  dependence,  are  fully 
shown  in  an  English  work  on  the  then  American  Colonies,  of  much 
ability,  published  in  London  at  the  time  when  Franklin  was  urging  upon 
his  countrymen  the  diversification  of  their  pursuits,  as  the  only  road 
towards  real  independence,  and  from  which  the  following  is  an  extract : 

"/The  population,  from  being  spread  round  a  great  extent  of  frontier,  would 
increase  without  giving  the  least  cause  of  jealousy  to  Britain;  land  would  not  only 
be  plentiful,  but  plentiful  where  our  people  wanted  it,  wher  as,  at  present,  the 
population  of  our  colonies,  especially  the  central  ones,  is  confined ;  they  have 
spread  over  all  the  space  between  the  sea  and  the  mountains,  the  consequence  of 
which  is,  that  land  is  becoming  scarce,  that  which  is  good  having  all  been  planted. 
The  people,  therefore,  find  themselves  too  numerous  for  the  agriculture,  which  ia 
the  first  step  to  becoming  manufacturers,  that  step  which  Britain  has  so  much 
reason  to  dreau  " 


26  FINANCIAL  CRISES: 

Why,  my  dear  sir,  should  Britain  have  so  much  dreaded  combination 
among  her  colonial  subjects  ?  Why  should  she  so  sedulously  have  sought 
to  disperse  them  over  the  extensive  tracts  of  land  beyond  the  mountains? 
Because,  the  more  they  scattered  the  more  dependent  they  could  be  kept, 
and  the  more  readily  they  could  be  compelled  to  carry  all  their  rude 
products  to  a  distant  market,  there  to  sell  them  so  cheaply,  as  we  are 
told  by  another  distinguished  British  writer,  "  that  not  one-fourth  of 
the  product  redounded  to  their  own  profit,"  as  a  consequence  of  which 
plantation  mortgages  were  most  abundant,  and  the  rate  of  interest  charged 
upon  them  so  very  high,  as  generally  to  eat  the  mortgagor  out  of  house 
and  home.  In  a  word,  the  system  of  that  day,  as  described  by  those 
writers,  was  almost  precisely  that  of  the  present  hour.  For  its  mainte- 
nance, dispersion  of  the  population  was  regarded  as  indispensable,  and 
that  it  might  be  attained,  the  course  of  action  here  described  was  re- 
comm'ended : 

"  Nothing  can  therefore  be  more  politic  than  to  provide  a  superabundance  of 
colonies  to  take  off  all  those  people  that  find  a  want  of  land  in  our  old  settle- 
ments ;  and  it  may  not  be  one  or  two  tracts  of  country  that  will  answer  this  pur- 
pose :  provision  should  be  made  for  the  convenience  of  some,  the  inclination  of 
others,  and  every  measure  taken  to  inform  the  people  of  the  colonies  that  were 
growing  too  populous,  that  land  was  plentiful  in  other  places,  and  granted  on  the 
easiest  terms;  and  if  such  inducements  were  not  found  sufficient  for  thinning  the 
country  considerably,  government  should  by  all  means  be  at  the  expense  of  trans- 
porting them.  Notice  should  be  given  that  sloops  would  be  always  ready  at  Fort 
Pitt,  or  as  much  higher  on  the  Ohio  as  is  navigable,  for  carrying  all  furniture 
without  expense,  to  whatever  settlement  they  chose,  on  the  Ohio  or  Mississippi. 
Such  measures,  or  similar  ones,  would  carry  off  the  surplus  of  population  in  the 
central  and  southern  colonies,  which  have  been  and  will  every  day  be  more  and 
more  the  foundation  of  manufactures." 

Having  studied  these  recommendations  in  regard  to  the  maintenance 
of  colonial  dependence,  I  will  ask  you  next  to  look  with  me  into  the 
working  of  the  British  free-trade  system,  and  satisfy  yourself  that  its 
advocates  have  been  mere  instruments  of  our  foreign  masters  —  closing 
our  mills,  furnaces,  and  factories,  retarding  the  development  of  our 
great  mineral  treasures,  preventing  the  utilization  of  our  vast  water 
powers,  and  in  this  manner  driving  our  people  to  the  West,  in  strict 
accordance  with  the  orders  of  those  British  traders  against  whom  our 
predecessors  made  the  Revolution. 

In  1815,  the  receipts  from  sales  of  public  lands  amounted  to  $1,287,000 
This  gives  a  measure  of  the  then  existing  tendency  toward  dispersion. 
Five  years  later,  when  the  free-trade  system  had  paralyzed  the  industry 
of  the  country,  they  had  risen  to  $3,274,000  —  the  customs  revenue  of 
the  same  year  yielding  more  than  $20,000,000.  The  government  had 
seemed  to  be  rich,  and  for  the  reason  that  it  was  "  burning  the  candle  at 
both  ends"  —  paralyzing  domestic  commerce,  and  driving  into  the  wil- 
derness the  people  to  whose  efforts  it  had  been  used  to  look  for  its  sup- 
port. Free-tradi  excitement  having  been  followed  by  paralysis,  we  find 
the  customs  revenue  to  have  fallen,  in  1821,  to  $13,000,000  —  the  land 
revenue  at  the  same  time  gradually  declining  until,  in  1823,  it  stood  at 
less  than  a  single  million.  As  a  consequence,  we  see  the  treasury  to 
have  been  so  much  embarrassed  as  to  be  under  the  necessity  of  con- 
tracting loans,  in  the  period  from  1819  to  1824,  to  the  extent  of  no 


THEIR   CAUSES   AND   EFFECTS.  27 

less  than  $16,000,000.  As  usual,  here  and  everywhere,  poverty,  dis- 
tress, and  debt,  to  both  the  people  and  the  government,  had  followed  in 
the  train  of  the  teachings  of  the  men  who  had  desired  a  readoption  of 
that  dispersive  policy  recommended  by  British  writers,  as  a  means  of 
prolonging  colonial  dependence. 

Turn  now,  if  you  please,  my  dear  sir,  to  the  picture  presented  by  the 
protective  tariff  of  1828,  and  mark  the  steadiness  of  customs  receipts, 
and  the  gentle  and  quiet  growth  of  the  receipts  from  lands,  as  follows : 

Customs.  Land  Sales.  Total. 

1829  $22,681,000  $1,617,000  $24,198,000 

1830  21,920,000  2,829,000  24,249,000 

1831   24,204,000  8,210,000  27,414,000 

1832  28,465,000  2,623,000  81,068,000 

1833  29,032,000  8,967,000  82,999,000 

In  this  period,  every  man  could  sell  his  labor,  and  could  therefore 
purchase  the  products  yielded  to  the  labor  of  others.  Every  one  being 
thus  enabled  to  contribute  his  share  to  the  support  of  the  government, 
the  revenue  had  become  so  large  and  steady  that  the  national  debt  was 
then  extinguished. 

Pass  on  now,  if  you  please,  to  the  time  when  the  approaching  annihi- 
lation of  protection  had  stopped  the  building  of  mills  and  the^  opening 
of  mines,  and  had  recommenced  to  compel  our  people  to  scatter  them- 
selves over  the  great  West,  and  find  the  following  figures : 

Customs.  Land.  Total. 

1835  $19,391,000  ..  $14,757,000  $34,148,000 

1836  .23,409,000  24,877,000  49,286,000 

Once  again,  the  government  was  "burning  the  candle  at  both  ends" 
—annihilating  the  power  of  combination,  and  thus  diminishing  the  pro- 
ductive forces  of  the  country.  As  before,  it  fancied  itself  rich,  and  acted 
accordingly — the  expenditure  of  this  period  almost  trebling  that  of  Mr. 
Adams's  administration,  then  but  a  few  years  past.  As  a  consequence, 
bankruptcy  of  the  people  and  of  the  banks  was  followed  by  disappear- 
ance of  the  power  to  contribute  to  the  support  of  government,  the  cus- 
toms duties  of  1841  having  but  little  exceeded  $14,000,000,  and  the 
land  sales  having  fallen  to  $1,300,000  —  giving  a  total  of  less  than 
$16,000,000,  not  even  one-third  of  that  of  1836.  Such  having  been 
the  case,  need  we  wonder  that  the  poverty  of  the  government  should 
have  exhibited  itself  in  the  form  of  irredeemable  notes,  and  in  vain 
efforts  to  effect  a  loan  in  any  part  of  Europe.  Having  destroyed  our 
domestic  commerce,  and  thus  greatly  diminished  the  productive  power 
of  the  country,  our  foreign  free-trade  friends  now  turned  their  backs 
upon  us  —  denouncing  our  whole  people  as  rogues  and  swindlers. 

Once  again,  in  1842,  we  find  the  readoption  of  the  policy  of  resistance 
to  British  domination,  and  once  again  we  meet  the  tranquillity  and  peace 
of  the  period  which  found  its  close  in  1834,  as  is  shown  in  the  following 
figures : 

Customs.  Land.  Total. 

1843-4  $26,183,000  $2,059,000  $28.242,000 

1844-5  27,508,000  2,077,000  29,585,000 

1845-6  „     26,712,000  2,694,000  29,406,000 

1846-7  23,747,000  ,.     2,498,000  26,245,000 


28  FINANCIAL  CRISES: 

Again,  as  always  under  protection,  there  was  economy  in  the  adminis- 
tration of"  the  government.  Again,  the  necessity  for  contracting  loans 
had  passed  away.  Again,  too,  the  foreign  debt  of  the  free-trade  period 
was  being  diminished;  and  why?  Because,  once  again,  that  colonial 
policy  which  looked  to  the  dispersion  of  our  people  had  been  rejected. 

Not  content  with  the  lesson  that  had  thus  been  taught,  the  protective 
policy  was  again  abandoned,  and  once  again  we  find  the  colonial  system 
re-established,  the  results  exhibiting  themselves  in  the  following  remark- 
able figures,  indicating  the  extent  to  which  the  government  has  recently 
been  repeating  the  experiment  of  "  burning  the  candle  at  both  ends" : 

Customs.  Land  Sales.  Total. 

1853-4  $64,224,000  $8,470,000  $72,694,000 

1854-5  53,025,000  11,497,000  64,522,000 

1855-6  64,022,000  8,917,009  72,939,000 

As  before,  in  every  free-trade  period,  the  government  was  becoming 
daily  richer,  while  the  productive  power  was  declining  from  day  to  day. 
Expenditures,  of  course,  increased  —  having  reached,  for  those  three 
years,  exclusive  of  interest  upon  a  large  public  debt,  an  average  of 
856,000,000,  or  nearly  five  times  more  than  they  had  been  thirty  years 
before. 

Having  thus  laid  the  foundation  for  a  crisis,  need  we  wonder  that  that 
crisis  came,  leaving  the  government,  but  recently  so  rich,  in  a  state  of 
actual  bankruptcy,  and  wholly  unable  to  meet  the  demands  upon  it? 
Certainly  not.  It  was  precisely  what  has  happened  in  every  British  free- 
trade  country  of  the  world,  and  in  every  free-trade  period  of  our  own. 
In  each  and  every  one,  our  people  had  been  driven  out  from  the  older 
States,  and  the  government  had  been  enabled  to  take  from  them,  in  pay- 
ment for  public  lands,  the  mass  of  their  little  capitals,  leaving  them  to 
borrow  at  three,  four,  or  five  per  cent,  per  month,  of  the  wealthy  capi- 
talist, all  that  had  been  required  to  pay  for  their  improvements  —  and 
finally  leaving  them  in  the  hands  of  the  sheriff,  under  whose  hammer 
their  property  had  sold  so  cheaply  as  almost  to  forbid  the  purchase  of 
lands  that  were  as  yet  public,  and  unimproved.  The  receipts  from  that 
source  are  now  estimated  at  $2,000,000,  and  thus  have  we  returned  to  a 
point  that  is  really  lower — our  numbers  being  considered — than  that  at 
which  we  arrived  at  the  close  of  the  British  free-trade  speculations  of 
1817-18  and  1836-39. 

Looking  at  all  these  facts,  my  dear  sir,  is  it  not  clear  — 

That  the  system  which  you  advocate,  and  which  has  usurped  the  free- 
trade  name,  is  but  a  return  to  that  colonial  one  described  in  the  passages 
above  submitted  for  your  perusal  ? 

That  it  has  for  its  object  the  destruction  of  the  power  of  combination, 
and  consequent  diminution  of  the  ability  to  produce  commodities  in 
which  to  trade  ? 

That,  as  a  necessary  consequence,  it  tends  to  produce  a  growing  de- 
pendence of  both  the  people  and  the  State  upon  foreign  traders  and 
foreign  bankers? 

That  to  its  present  long  continuance  is  due  the  fact,  that  British  jour- 
nalists now  speculate  upon  "  the  recovery  of  that  influenc J  which  eighty 
years  ago  England  was  supposed  to  have  lost"  ? 


THEIR   CAUSES  AND   EFFECTS.  29 

That  the  tendency  toward  recolonization  is  growing  with  every  hour, 
and  that  with  each  successive  one,  we  are  more  and  more  becoming 
mere  tools  in  the  hands  of  British  traders  ? 

That,  therefore,  it  is  the  duty  of  every  friend  of  freedom  and  inde- 
pendence to  lend  his  aid  to  the  re-establishment  of  that  protective  sys- 
tem under  which  the  country  so  much  advanced  in  prosperity  and  power, 
in  the  periods  which  closed  in'1816,  1834,  and  1847? 

Repeating  the  proposition,  already  so  often  made,  to  have  your  answers 
to  these  questions  placed  before  a  million  and  a  half  of  protectionist 
readers,  I  remain,  my  dear  sir,  with  great  respect, 

Your  obedient  servant, 

HENRY  C.  CAREY. 
W.  C.  BKYANT,  ESQ. 

PHILADELPHIA,  February  7,  I860, 


30  FINANCIAL  CRISES: 


LETTER    SEVENTH. 

DEAR  SIR.  —  The  essential  object  of  the  British  system,  as  you 
have  already  seen,  is  the  suppression,  in  every  country  of  the  world, 
outside  of  Britain,  of  that  diversity  of  human  employments,  without 
which  there  can  be  made  no  single  step  toward  freedom.  The  more 
that  object  can  be  achieved,  the  more  must  other  nations  be  compelled 
to  export  their  products,  and  in  their  rudest  shape,  to  Britain  —  doing 
so  in  direct  opposition  to  the  advice  of  Adam  Smith. — This  is  what  is 
called  British  free  trade,  the  base  of  which  is  found  in  that  annihilation 
of  domestic  commerce,  whose  effects  exhibit  themselves  in  the  poverty, 
wretchedness,  and  crime  of  India,  Ireland,  Turkey,  and  other  countries 
subjected  to  the  system,  all  of  which  are  so  well  reproduced  among  our- 
selves in  every  British  free  trade  period.  Real  freedom  of  commerce 
consists  in  going  where  you  will  —  exporting  finished  commodities  to 
every  portion  of  the  world.  Seeking  that  freedom,  the  most  eminent 
French  economists,  as  you  have  already  seen,  have  held  that  it  was 
"  only  the  accomplishment  of  a  positive  duty"  for  governments  "  so  to 
act  as  to  favor  the  taking  possession  of  all  the  branches  of  industry  whose 
acquisition  is  favored  by  the  nature  of  things,"  and  that  when  they  failed 
to  do  so,  they  made  "  a  great  mistake." 

In  full  accordance  with  the  idea  thus  expressed,  the  French  Govern- 
ment has  adhered  to  the  policy  of  protection  with  a  steadiness  without 
example — the  great  result  exhibiting  itself  in  an  export  of  the  products 
of  agriculture,  in  a  finished  form,  such  as  can  nowhere  else  be  found. 
Thus  protecting  domestic  commerce,  the  government  finds  itself  repaid 
in  the  power  to  obtain  revenue  from  a  foreign  commerce  that  has  quad- 
rupled in  the  short  space  of  thirty  years  —  the  $100,000,000  of  1830 
having  been  replaced  by  the  almost  $400,000,000  of  each  of  the  last 
three  years  —  the  population  meantime  having  remained  almost  station- 
ary. As  a  consequence  of  this  the  reward  of  labor  has  much  increased, 
the  people  have  become  more  free,  and  the  State  has  grown  in  influence 
with  a  rapidity  unknown  elsewhere. 

That  it  is  to  industrial  development  we  are  to  look  for  the  creation  of 
a  real  agriculture,  can  now  be  no  longer  doubted — the  Emperor  having, 
in  his  recent  letter,  told  his  finance  minister,  that "  without  a  prosperous 
industry  agriculture  itself  remains  in  its  infancy;"  that  "it  is  necessary 
to  liberate  industry  from  all  internal  impediments,"  and  thereby  "  im- 
prove our  agriculture ;"  and  that  in  so  doing  the  government  will  be 
"  creating  a  national  wealth"  and  diffusing  "  comforts  among  the  working- 
classes." 

Nothing  more  accurate  than  this  could  have  been  said  by  the  great 
Colbert  himself — the  man  to  whose  labors  France  was  first  indebted  for 
the  relief  of  her  domestic  commerce  from  the  pressure  of  internal  restric- 
tions and  external  warfare.  Compare  it,  however,  I  pray  you,  with  our 
policy,  erroneously  styled  the  free  trade  one,  every  portion  of  which 


THEIR  CAUSES   AND  EFFECTS.  31 

seems  to  have  had  for  its  object  the  creation  of  impediments  to  domestic 
commerce,  and  the  subjugation  of  our  farmers  to  the  tyranny  of  foreign 
traders.  Look,  if  you  please,  to  the  almost  endless  series  of  laws  haying 
for  their  object  the  compulsory  use  of  gold  and  silver,  in  a  country  -which 
exports  the  precious  metals  to  such  extent  as  to  have  driven  our  people, 
throughout  a  large  extent  of  country,  to  the  payment  of  three,  four,  and 
five  per  cent  per  month,  for  the  use  of  the  small  amount  of  money 
which,  even  at  such  rates,  can  be  obtained.  Turn  next  to  the  postage 
law  proposed  by  your  Southern  free  trade  friends,  at  the  last  session,  by 
means  of  which  the  charge  for  the  transmission  of  letters  was  to  be 
almost  doubled.  Study  then  the  constant  succession  of  free  trade  crises, 
by  means  of  which  our  domestic  commerce  has  been  so  often  paralyzed. 
Pass  on,  and  find  the  closing  of  furnaces  and  mills,  followed  by  constant 
increase  of  difficulty  in  the  sale  of  labor  —  constantly  growing  pauperism 
and  crime  —  and  as  constant  increase  of  that  dependence  upon  foreign 
markets  which  has,  in  every  other  country,  been  attended  by  growth  of 
slavery  among  men,  whether  black,  brown,  or  white.  Look  where  you 
may,  you  will  find  the  system  of  which  you  have  been  the  steady  advo- 
cate, leading  to  the  adoption  of  measures  directly  opposed  to  the  teach- 
ings of  Adam  Smith  and  those  of  his  most  distinguished  successors, 
here  endorsed  by  Louis  Napoleon. 

Turn  next  to  another  passage  of  the  imperial  letter,  and  find  in  it 
that  agriculture  must  have  "  its  share  in  the  benefits  of  the  institutions 
of  credit,"  and  that  the  government  must  "devote "annually  a  considerable 
sum  to  works  of  drainage,  irrigation,  and  clearage."  Having  read  this, 
study,  if  you  please,  the  proceedings  of  your  free  trade  friends,  constantly 
engaged  as  they  have  been,  in  the  effort  to  destroy  the  credit  of  banks, 
and  to  prevent  the  substitution  of  paper  for  gold  —  and  thus  so  far  de- 
stroying confidence,  that  tens  of  millions  of  specie  are  now  hoarded  in 
private  vaults  by  men  who  dare  not  spend  it,  and  fear  to  lend  it  at  any 
interest  whatsoever. — Turn,  thence,  to  the  condition  of  our  treasury,  and 
contrast  it  with  that  of  France  —  the  latter  proposing  to  lend  money  to 
the  people  at  low  interest,  while  the  former  is  constantly  in  the  market 
as  a  borrower,  and  at  higher  rates  of  interest  than  are  paid  by  any  govern- 
ment that  claims  to  rank  as  civilized. 

Pass  next  to  manufactures,  and  find  the  Emperor  telling  his  minister 
that,  "to  encourage  industrial  production,- he  must  liberate  from  every 
tax  all  raw  material  indispensable  to  industry,"  and  that  he  must  "  allow 
it,  exceptionally,  and  at  a  moderate  rate,  as  has  already  been  done  for 
agriculture,  the  funds  necessary  to  perfect  its  raw  material " —  meaning 
thereby,  as  I  understand  it,  further  grants  of  aid  ^imilar  to  those  which 
have  resulted  in  improving  the  breed  of  sheep,  and  in  giving  to  French 
agriculture  many  products  not  native  to  the  soil,  and  yet  essential  to 
the  perfection  of  manufactures. — Having  studied  this,  allow  me  next  to 
request  that  you  will  examine  thi  teachings,  of  the  author  of  the  tariff" 
of  1846 — the  tariff  you  have  so  steadily  admired — and  find  him  protest- 
ing against  the  imposition  of  "higher  duties  upon  the  manufactured 
fabric  than  upon  the  agricultural  product  out  of  which  it  is  made." 
Examine,  then,  his  tariff,  and  find  in  it  a  systematic  effort  at  the  dis- 
couragement of  industrial  production  by  the  imposition  of  heavy  duties 
on  the  raw  material  of  manufactures  —  sometimes  so  great,  even,  as  to 


S2  FINANCIAL  CRISES: 

exceed  those  paid  by  the  finished  commodities  for'  the  production  of 
which  they  were  needed  to  be  used.  That  done,  look  next  at  the  re- 
peated efforts  of  private  individuals  to  improve  our  breed  of  sheep,  and 
at  the  ruin  that  has  been  the  consequence  —  that  ruin  having  resulted 
necessarily  from  changes  of  policy  that  have  closed  our  factories  and 
sent  merinos  to  the  slaughter-house.  Look  in  what  direction  you  may, 
you  will  find  that,  with  the  exception  of  the  brief  and  brilliant  period 
of  the  tariff  of  1842,  the  men  engaged  in  the  development  of  our  great 
mineral  treasures,  and  those  engaged  in  introducing,  extending,  and  per- 
fecting works  of  conversion,  and  thereby  giving  the  farmer  a  market 
for  his  products,  have  been  regarded  as  enemies,  deserving  only  of  the 
hatred  of  the  government;  as  men  for  the  accomplishment  of  whose 
ruin  fraud 'and  falsehood  might  justly  be  resorted  to  —  the  holiness  of 
the  end  sanctifying  the  employment  of  any  means  that  might  be  used. 

Adopting  these  ideas,  the  Emperor  assures  his  minister  that  he  will 
find  in  them  the  road  toward  real  freedom  of  trade  —  the  great  exten- 
sion of  commerce  producing  a  necessity  for  "  successive  reductions  of  the 
duty  on  articles  of  great  consumption,  as  also  the  substitution  of  pro- 
tecting duties  for  the  prohibitive  system  which  limits  our  commercial 
relations." —  Having  read  this,  do  me  the  favor  to  turn  to  the  period  of 
the  protective  tariff  of  1828,  and  find  there  precisely  the  state  of  things 
here  described  —  the  great  increase  of  revenue  having  then  produced  a 
necessity  for  abolishing  the  duties  that  had  always  thus  far  been  paid 
by  tea  and  coffee.  Look,  next,  to  the  working  of  that  dispersive  system, 
which  scatters  our  population  over  the  continent,  and  destroys  the  power 
of  combination  —  at  one  moment  filling  the  treasury  to  repletion  by 
means  of  custom-house  receipts  and  sales  of  public  lands,  and  then 
leaving  it  bankrupt,  to  seek,  as  was  done  in  1842,  and  is  now  being 
done,  for  loans  abroad,  to  keep  the  wheels  of  government  in  motion  until 
the  tariff  can  be  raised. 

The  policy  of  the  French  Government  was  accurately  defined,  some 
three  or  four  years  since,  by  the  President  of  the  Council,  and  there  is 
nothing  in  the  Emperor's  letter  that  is  not  ;n  strict  accordance  with  the 
determination  then  expressed,  as  follows: 

"The  Government  formally  rejects  the  principle  of  free  trade,  as  incompatible 
•with  the  independence  and  security  of  a  great  nation,  and  as  destructive  of  her 
noblest  manufactures.  No  doubt,  our  customs-tariffs  contain  useless  and  anti- 
quated prohibitions,  and  we  think  they  must  be  removed.  Protection,  however, 
is  necessary  to  our  manufactures.  This  protection  must  not  be  blind,  unchange- 
able, or  excessive;  but  the  principle  of  it  must  be  firmly  maintained." 

We  are  told,  however,  that  a  treaty  has  been  signed,  in  which  there 
are  great  advances  toward  freedom  of  trade.  If  so,  it  does  but  prove 
the  perfect  accuracy  of  M.  Chevalier,  who  is  said  to  have  been  the 
French  negociator,  in  regarding  protection  of  the  domestic  commerce  as 
the  real  and  certain  mode  of  reaching  freedom  of  intercourse  with  foreign 
nations.  "  In  every  country,"  as  he  has  told  his  readers,  "  there  arises 
a  necessity  for  acclimating  among  its  people  the  principal  branches  of 
industry" — agriculture  alone  becoming  insufficient.  "Every  commu- 
nity, considerable  in  numbers,  and  occupying  an  extensive  territory," 
is  therefore,  as  he  thinks,  "  well  inspired,  when  seeing  to  the  establish- 


THEIR   CAUSES   AND   EFFECTS.  33 

ment,  among  its  members,  of  diversity  in  the  modes  of  employment. 
From  the  moment  that  it  approaches  maturity,  it  should  seek  to  prepare 
itself  therefor,  and  when  it  fails  to  do  so,  it  makes  a  great  mistake." 
This  "  combination  of  varied  effort,"  as  he  continues,  "  is  not  only  pro- 
motive  of  general  prosperity,  but  it  is  the  condition  of  national  progress." 
Elsewhere,  he  says,  that  "governments  are,  in  effect,  the  personification 
of  nations,  and  it  is  required  that  they  should  exercise  their  influence  in 
the  direction  indicated  by  the  general  interest,  properly  studied  and 
carefully  appreciated."  Therefore  does  he  "  regard  as  excellent,  the 
desire  of  some  of  the  most  eminent  men  of  the  principal  nations  of 
Europe  to  establish  around  them  the  various  branches  of  manufactures." 

Such  being  the  latest  views  of  the  present  leading  free-trade  writer 
of  France,  we  may,  I  think,  feel  quite  assured  that  what  he  may  now 
have  done,  is  only  what  he  has  regarded  as  warranted  by  the  advanced 
position  occupied  by  French  manufactures  —  that  position  having  been 
attained  by  means  of  a  steady  pursuit  of  the  protective  policy.  It  is 
the  point  at  which  we  have  ourselves  arrived  in  reference  to  every 
branch  of  manufacture  that  has  found  itself  efficiently  protected  in  the 
domestic  market,  whether  by  the  particular  circumstances  of  the  case, 
or  by  aid  of  revenue  laws.  More  steadily  than  to  any  other,  was  protec- 
tion given  to  the  production  of  coarse  cottons,  and  hence  it  is,  that  we 
now  export  them.  The  newspaper  is  protected  by  locality,  and  that 
protection  is  absolute  and  complete ;  and  hence  it  is,  that  we  have  now 
the  cheapest  journals  in  the  world.  The  piano  manufacture  is  protected 
by  climate;  and  therefore  it  is,  that  it  has  attained  a  development  ex- 
ceeding that  of  any  other  country.  Had  iron  been  as  well  protected, 
our  annual  product  would  count  by  millions  of  tons,  and  we  should  be 
now  exporting,  in  the  forms  of  iron,  and  manufactures  of  iron,  a  quan- 
tity of  food  twice  greater  than  that  we  send  to  Europe.  All  our  expe- 
rience shows,  that  the  more  perfect  the  security  of  the  manufacturer  in 
the  domestic  market,  the  greater  is  the  tendency  to  that  increase  of 
competition  needed  for  enabling  us  soon  to  commence  the  work  of  sup- 
plying the  exterior  world. 

In  your  notice  of  the  changes  now  proposed  in  the  French  commercial 
system,  you  speak  in  terms  of  high  approval  of  Mons.  Chevalier,  as  a 
"  zealous  adversary  of  commercial  restrictions,"  but  have  you  ever,  my 
dear  sir,  taught  the  doctrines  of  the  teacher  of  whom  you  now  so  much 
approve  ?  Have  you  ever  told  your  readers, — 

That  "  every  community  is  well-inspired  when  seeing  to  the  establish- 
ment among  its  members,  of  diversity  in  the  modes  of  employment"? 

That  "  combination  of  varied  effort  is  the  condition  of  national  pro- 
gress "  ? 

That  "  every  nation,  therefore,  owes  it  to  itself  to  seek  the  establish- 
ment of  diversification  in  the  pursuits  of  its  people,  as  Germany  and 
England  have  already  done  in  regard  to  cottons  and  woollens,  and  as 
France  has  done  in  reference  to  so  many,  and  so  widely-different  kinds 
of  manufacturing  industry"? 

That  "  governments  are  in  effect  the  personification  of  nations,  and 
should  exercise  their  influence  in  the  direction  of  the  general  interest, 
properly  studied  and  fully  appreciated  "  ?  And,  therefore 

That  "  it  is  only  the  accomplishment  of  a  positive  duty  so  to  act,  at 


34  FINANCIAL  CRISES: 

each  epoch  in  the*  progress  of  a  nation,  as  to  favor  the  taking  possession 
of  all  the  branches  of  industry  whose  acquisition  is  authorized  by  the 
nature  of  things  "  ? 

Unhappily,  such  have  not  been  the  teachings  of  the  Post.  Had  they 
been  such — had  your  journal  sustained  the  policy  advocated  by  Mons. 
Chevalier,  as  here  established  at  the  date  of  the  fearful  financial  crisis 
of  1842,  should  we  not,  even  at  this  time,  have  been  far  advanced  toward 
that  position  in  which  we  could  feel  that  protection  would  cease  to  be 
required  ?  Unfortunately,  it  has  taught  the  reverse  of  this  —  the  results 
exhibiting  themselves  in  a  constant  succession  of  financial  crises,  and 
paralyses  of  the  most  fearful  kind  —  in  repeated  bankruptcies  of  the 
treasury,  of  banks,  railroad  companies,  and  merchants  —  in  an  almost 
entire  destruction  of  confidence  —  in  the  subjugation  of  the  poor  bor- 
rower to  the  rich  money-lender,  to  an  extent  unparalleled  in  any  civi- 
lized country  of  the  world  —  and  in  a  growth  of  pauperism,  slavery,  and 
crime,  that  must  be  arrested  if  we  would  not  see  a  perfection  of  anarchy 
established  as  being  the  condition  of  our  national  existence. 

Had  you  and  others  taught  the  doctrines  of  M.  Chevalier,  would  such 
be  now  the  state  of  things  in  a  country  so  richly  endowed  by  nature  as 
our  own  ? 

Not  having  taught  them,  and  such  having  been  the  results  of  your 
past  teachings,  is  it  not  now  your  duty,  as  a  man,  as  a  lover  of  liberty, 
and  as  a  Christian,  ,to  study  anew  the  doctrines  of  the  economist  you 
have  so  much  commended,  and  satisfy  yourself  that  you  have  been 
steadily  advocating  the  extension  of  slavery  while  desiring  to  be  the 
advocate  of  freedom  ? 

Hoping  that  you  may  conclude  to  furnish  answers  to  these  questions, 
and  reiterating  the  assurance  that  they  shall  have  the  largest  circulation 
among  tte  advocates  of  protection,  I  remain,  my  dear  sir, 

Yours,  very  truly, 

HENRY  C.  CAREY. 
W.  C.  BRTAKT,  ESQ. 

PHILADELPHIA,  February  14,  1860. 


THEIE   CAUSES   AND   EFFECTS.  35 


LETTER    EIGHTH. 

DEAR  SIR. —  For  the  maintenance  of  colonial  dependence,  and  for 
the  perpetuation  of  power  to  compel  the  colonists  to  make  their  exchanges 
in  a  foreign  market  from  which  they  were  allowed  to  carry  away  but  one- 
fourth  of  the  real  value  of  their  products,  it  was,  as  you  have  already 
seen,  held  that  they  should  be  led  to  disperse  themselves  throughout  the 
West — thereby  almost  annihilating  that  power  of  association  which,  as 
then  was  feared,  might  lead  to  such  increase  of  wealth  and  strength  as 
would  forward  the  cause  of  independence.  For  the  accomplishment  of 
that  great  object,  the  aid  of  government  was  then  invoked  —  its  help 
being  needed  for  providing  lands  and  means  of  transportation.  Since 
then,  the  British  free  trade  system  has  been  employed  to  do  the  work, 
its  mode  of  action  being  that  one  sen  well  described  in  a  Parliamentary 
document  now  but  a  few  years  old,  the  following  extract  from  which  is 
here  submitted  far  your  perusal : 

"  The  laboring  classes  generally,  in  the  manufacturing  districts  of  this  country, 
find  especially  in  the  iron  and  coal  districts,  are  very  little  aware  of  the  extent  to 
which  they  are  often  indebted  for  their  being  employed  at  all  to  the  immense 
losses  which  their  employers  voluntarily  incur  in  bad  times,  in  order  to  destroy 
foreign  competition,  and  to  gain  and  keep  possession  of  foreign  markets.  /  Authentic 
instances  are  well  known  of  employers  having  in  suqh  times  carried  on  their  works 
at  a  loss  amounting  in  the  aggregate  to  three  or  four  hundred  thousand  pounds  in 
the  course  of  three  or  four  years.  If  the  efforts  of  those  who  encourage  the  com- 
binations to  restrict  the  amount  of  labor  and  to  produce  strikes  were  to  be  suc- 
cessful for  any  length  of  time,  the  great  accumulations  of 'capital  could  no  longer 
be  made  which  enable  a  few  of  the  most  wealthy  capitalists  to  overwhelm  all  foreign 
competition  in  times  of  great  depression,  and  thus  to  clear  the  way  for  the  whole,  trade 
to  step  in  when  prices  revive,  and  to  carry  on  a  great  business  before  foreign 
capital  can  again  accumulate  to  such  an  extent  as  to  be  able  to  establish  a  com- 
petition in  prices  with  any  chance  of  success.  The  large  capitals  of  this  country 
are  the  great  instruments  of  warfare  against  the  competing  capital  of  foreign  countries, 
and  are  the  most  essential  instruments  now  remaining  by  which  our  manufacturing 
supremacy  can  be  maintained  ;  the  other  elements  —  cheap  labor,  abundance  of 
raw  materials,  means  of  communication,  and  skilled  labor — being  rapidly  in  pro- 
cess of  being  equalized." 

The  system  here  so  admirably  described,  is  very  properly  characterized 
as  being  a  "  warfare ;"  and  it  may  now  be  proper  to  inquire-  for  what 
purposes,  and  against  whom,  it  is  waged.  It  is  a  war,  as  you  see,  my 
dear  sir,  for  cheapening  all  the  commodities  we  have  to  sell,  labor  and 
raw  materials — being  precisely  the  object  sought  to  be  accomplished  by 
that  "  Mercantile  System,"  whose  error  was  so  well  exposed  in  the 
Wealth  of  Nations.  It  is  a  war  for  compelling  the  people  of  all  other  lands 
to  confine  themselves  to  agriculture  —  for  preventing  the  diversification 
of  employments  in  other  countries  —  for  retarding  the  development  of 
intellect — :for  palsying  every  movement,  elsewhere,  looking  to  the  utili- 
zation of  the  metallic  treasures  of  the  earth — for  increasing  the  difficulty 
of  obtaining  iron — for  diminishing  the  demand  for  labor — for  doing  all 


86  FINANCIAL  CRISES: 

these  things  at  home  and  abroad — .and  for,  in  this  manner,  subjecting 
all  the  farmers  and  planters  of  the  world  to  the  domination  of  the 
manufacturers  of  Britain. 

How  our  government  co-operates  in  this  warfare  upon  its  people,  and 
in  the  promotion  of  the  great  work  of  recolonization,  will  readily,  my 
dear  sir,  be  understood  by  all  who  shall  study  the  British  prescription 
given  in  a  former  letter,  and  shall  then  compare  it  with  the  course  of 
action  here,  under  your  advice,  so  steadily  pursued  —  expending,  as  we 
have  done,  and  now  are  seeking  to  do,  enormous  sums,  and  even  carrying 
on  distant  wars,  for  the  acquisition  of  further  territory  —  making  large 
grants  of  land  for  facilitating  the  construction  of  roads  and  the  disper- 
sion of  our  people — forcing  millions  of  acres  upon  the  market,  and  then 
rejoicing  over  the  receipts,  as  if 'they  furnished  evidence  of  increasing 
strength,  and  not  of  growing  weakness  —  wasting  the  proceeds  in  politi- 
cal jobs  of  the  most  disgraceful  kind,  and  in  this  manner  producing 
financial  crises  that  close  our  mines,  furnaces,  and  mills,  and  drive  our 
people  to  seek  a  refuge  in  the  wilderness,  there  to  pay  the  speculator 
treble  price  for  land  —  and  thus  enabling  him  to  demand  three,  four, 
or  five  per  cent  per  month,  for  «the  use  of  some  small  amount  of 
capital  to  aid  in  clearing  the  land  thus  purchased,  and  in  erecting  the 
little  dwelling. — The  house  built,  and  the  farm  commenced,  next  comes 
the  sheriff,  and  by  his  aid  the  poor  colonist  is  now  driven  to  seek  a  new 
refuge  in  some  yet  more  distant  territory —  in  full  accordance  with  the 
desires  of  those  of  our  free  trade  friends  abroad,  who  see  in  every 
attempt  at  combination  a  step  toward  manufactures  —  "  that  step  which 
Britain  has  so  much  cause  to  dread." 

That  such  are  the  facts  presented  by  our  records  cannot  be  denied. 
Having  studied  them  with  the  attention  they  demand,  you  will,  my  dear 
sir,  be  in  a  position  to  answer  to  yourself,  even  if  not  to  me,  the  question 

—  Does  the  history  of  the  world,  in  any  of  its  pages,  exhibit  evidence 
of  the  existence  elsewhere  of  so  powerful  a  combination  for  the  pro- 
motion of  that  pauperism  and  crime,  whose  extraordinary  growth  you 
have  so  well  described  ?     So  far  as  my  knowledge  of  history  extends,  it 
warrants  me  in  saying,  that  no  such  evidence  can  be  presented. 

The  poor  colonist,  thus  driven  out,  suffers  under  a  tax  for  transporta- 
tion that,  if  continued,  must  for  ever  keep  him  poor.  His  need  for 
better  roads  is  great,  but  of  power  to  assist  himself  he  has  none  what- 
ever. His  distant  masters  may,  perhaps,  be  induced  to  grant  him  help 

—  knowing,  as  they  do,  that  each  new  road  will  act  as  a  feeder  of  their 
coffers,  while  aiding  in  the  destruction  of  the  powers  of  the  soil,  in  the 
further  scattering  of  their  subjects,  and  in  more  firmly  establishing  their 
own  security  against  the  adoption  of  any  measures  tending  to  the  pro- 
motion of  industrial  independence.     Lands  are  now  mortgaged,  and  at 
enormous  rates  of  interest,  as  the  only  mode  of  obtaining  the  means 
with  which  to  commence  the  road.    The  work  half  made,  it  becomes  next 
needful-to  raise  the  means  with  which  to  finish  it,  and  bonds  are  now 
created,  bearing  six,  eight,  or  ten  per  cent  interest,  to  be  given  at 
enormous  discounts,  in  exchange   for   iron  so  poor  in  quality  that  it 
would  find  a  market  nowhere  else  —  its  wear  and  tear  being  such  as 
must  prove  destructive  to  its  unhappy  purchaser.     Under  such  circum- 
stances the  road  fails  to  pay,  and  it  passes  into  the  hands  of  mortgagees, 


THEIR  CAUSES  AND   EFFECTS.  37 

leaving  those  by  whom  the  work  was  started,  poorer  than  before — their 
lands  being  heavily  mortgaged,  and  they  themselves  being  at  last  driven 
out  of  house  and  home.  Such  is  the  history  of  most  of  the  persons  who 
have  contributed  toward  the  commencements  of  the  road  and  canal 
improvements  of  which  we  so  much  boast,  and  such  the  history  of 
the  roads  themselves  -r-  each  and  every  financial  crisis  causing  further 
absorption  of  American  railroad  property  by  English  bondholders,  as 
has  been  already  done  in  reference  to  th,e  Reading,  Erie,  and  so  many 
other  roads. 

Must  this  continue  to  be  so  ?  It  must,  and  for  the  reason,  that  our 
whole  policy  tends  toward  the  annihilation  of  local  action  and  domestic 
commerce — that  commerce  in  the  absence  of  which  railroads  can  never 
be  made  to  pay  interest  on  the  debts  to  the  contraction  of  which  their 
owners  have  been  driven.  The  greater  their  dependence  upon  distant 
trade,  the  more  imperative  becomes,  from  day  to  day,  the  necessity  for 
fighting  for  it — for  adopting  measures  tending  to  the  further  destruc- 
tion of  local  traffic  —  and  for  thus  rendering  more  and  more  certain  the 
ultimate  ruin  of  nearly  every  railroad  company  of  the  Union.  How  is 
it  with  yourselves  —  with  the  people  of  your  State  ?  But  a  short  time 
since,  we  were  assured  that  a  barrel  of  flour  could  be  transported  to  your 
city  from  Rochester  at  less  cost  than  from  Utica  —  from  Buffalo  more 
cheaply  than  from  Rochester  —  from  Cleveland  for  less  than  from 
Buffalo — and  from  Chicago  more  cheaply  than  from  Cleveland  —  your 
railroad  companies  thus  offering  large  bounties  on  the  abandonment  of 
the  soil  of  the  State,  and  thereby  aiding  our  foreign  masters  in  the  ac- 
complishment of  the  dispersion  of  our  people.  So  is  it  in  this  State  of 
Pennsylvania  —  through  freight  being  carried  at  less  than  cost,  while 
domestic  commerce  is  taxed  for  the  payment  of  losses,  interest,  salaries, 
and  dividends. — In  ajl  this  there  is  a  tyranny  of  trade  that  has  at  length 
become  so  entirely  insupportable,  that  the  farmers  of  the  older  States 
are  now  clamorous  for  measures  of  relief —  urging  upon  their  re- 
spective legislatures  the  adoption  of  laws  in  virtue  of  which  they  shall 
be  relieved  from  a  tax  of  transportation  that  is  destroying  the  value  of 
their  land  and  labor,  and  that  must  result  m  the  crippling  of  all  the 
Atlantic  States,  as  well  as  of  some  of  the  older  of  their  Western 
neighbors. 

To  such  demand  on  the  part  of  your  farmers,  you,  however,  reply, 
that  it  would  be  "  legislation  against  trade"  —  that  "  nothing  could  be 
more  impolitic  than  this  process"  '• — that 

"The  citizens  of  Baltimore  and  Philadelphia,  if  they  should  think  it  decorous 
and  politic  to  do  such  a  thing,  might  well  pass  a  public  vote  of  thanks  to  the 
legislature  •which  would,enact  such  a  law.  The  moment  it  is  passed,  all  the  through 
trade,  all  the  vast  accumulations  of  the  produce  of  the  West  which  now  find  their 
way  to  New  York  by  the  New  York  Central  Railroad,  will  desert  it.  When  the 
Governor  of  New  York  signs  the  bill  preventing  free  competition  between  our 
Central  Railroad  and  its  more  southern  rivals,  he  signs  a  bill  for  the  relief  of 
.Philadelphia  and  the  aggrandizement  of  Baltimore,  and  there  will  be  great 

rejoicing  in  those  cities,  whether  it  be  publicly  expressed  or  not The 

people  of  Maryland  and  Pennsylvania  make  no  laws  to  prevent  the  competition 
of  their  railways  with  ours.  They  are  satisfied  to  let  those  who  manage  them 
draw  off  as  great  a  proportion  of  the  freight  from  our  channels  of  transportation 
as  they  are  able,  and  they  will  be  very  glad  of  our  co-operation  iu  this  work. 


38  FINANCIAL  CRISES: 

Baltimore  has  invested  sixty  millions  of  dollars  in  the  railways  which  centre  in 
that  flourishing  city.  Whether  these  are  profitably  managed  or  not,  is  not  so 
much  the  question  with  those  who  contribute  the  money,  as  whether  the  effect 
shall  be  to  build  up  Baltimore  as  a  great  mart,  and  make  Maryland  the  thorough- 
fare of  an  active  trade.  Baltimore  is  the  commercial  gate  of  the  South  ;  her 
ambition  is  to  become  that  of  the  West  also.  No  measure  could  be  better  calcu- 
lated to  conspire  with  this  ambition,  and  further  this  intent,  than  the  pro  rata 
freight  bill  now  before  our  legislature.  We  earnestly  hope  that  those  members 
who  have  been  induced  to  favor  it  will  give  the  subject  a  more  careful  considera- 
tion, and  spare  us  from  an  enactment  the  error  of  which  will  be  but  too  deplorably 
evident  before  another  legislature  can  assemble." 

In  all  this,  I  find  no  single  word  in  favor  of  the  farmers  and  land- 
holders of  your  State  —  those  people  upon  whom  you  so  long  have 
urged  considerauon  of  the  advantage  that  must  result  to  them  from 
destroying  internal  commerce  and  readopting  the  colonial  system  against 
which  our  predecessors  made  the  Revolution.  Had  you  now  occasion  to 
talk  to  them,  you  would  probably  say  — "  Gentlemen  farmers,  you  are 
entirely  in  error  in  supposing  that  you  have  any  interests  that  require 
to  be  considered.  The  more  you  can  be  forced  to  become  dependent 
upon  Britain,  the  more  rapid  will  be  the  growth  of  cities  like  our  own. 
That  the  dependence  may  be  increased  it  is  needed  that  we  close  the 
mills,  mines,  and  furnaces  of  the  Union ;  that  we  render  the  laborer 
more  and  more  dependent  upon  the  capitalist ;  that  financial  crises  con- 
tinue to  increase  in  number  and  intensity;  that  the  rate  of  interest  be 
maintained  so  high  as  to  ruin  farmers,  manufacturers,  and  railroad  com- 
panies, while  increasing  the  number  of  millionaires ;  that  pauperism  and 
crime  continue  to  increase,  with  constant  diminution  in  the  power  to 
purchase  the  products  of  the  farm ;  that  the  productiveness  of  your  land 
continue  to  diminish  as  it  now  is  doing ;  that  our  people  be  dispersed ; 
and  that  railroads  continue  to  co-operate  with  the  government  in  the 
effort  to  destroy  that  power  of  association  to  which,  alone,  should  we 
look,  did  we  desire  to  witness  your  growth  in  strength,  wealth,  and  power. 
The  heavier  your  taxation,  the  higher  will  be  the  prices  of  our  city  lots." 
That  the  British  free  trade  system  is  one  of  universal  discord  is  proved 
by  the  commerce  of  India,  Ireland,  Turkey,  and  all  other  countries 
subject  to  it,  and  by  pur  own,  in  every  period  of  its  existence.  That 
opposition  to  it  is  productive  of  harmony,  force,  and  strength,  is  shown 
in  the  movements  of  Germany,  France,  and  every  other  country  that 
looks  to  the  development  of  internal  commerce  as  furnishing  the  real 
base  of  an  extended  intercourse  with  other  nations.  Turn,  if  you  please, 
to  the  recent  letter  of  the  French  Emperor,  and  find  him  telling  his 
finance  minister  that  — 

•'One  of  the  greatest  services  to  be  rendered  to  the  country  is  to  facilitate  the 
transport  of  articles  of  first  necessity  to  agriculture  and  industry.  With  this 
object,  the  Minister  of  Public  Works  will  cause  to  be  executed  as  promptly  as 
possible  the  means  of  communication,  canals,  roads,  and  railways,  whose  main 
object  will  be  to  convey  coal  and  manure  to  the  districts  where  the  wants  of  pro- 
duction require  them,  and  will  endeavor  to  reduce  the  tariffs  by  establishing  an 
equitable  competition  between  the  canals  and  railways." 

Compare  with  this  the  teachings  of  the  Post,  and  you  will  find  the 
latter'saying  directly  the  reverse — exhibiting  the  advantage  of  sending 
to  England  all  our  products  in  their  rudest  forms,  thus  losing  the 


THEIE  CAUSES   AND   EFFECTS.  39 

manure,  and  driving  our  people  to  the  West,  there  to  find  a  constant 
increase  in  the  necessity  for  roads,  accompanied  by  as  constant  decrease 
in  the  power  to  make  them. — That  done,  allow  me  to  ask  your  attention 
to  the  steady  growth  of  harmony  in  the  interests  of  railroad  owners, 
farmers,  and  manufacturers,  exhibited  in  the  following  figures  repre- 
senting the  receipts  of  French  railroads  in  recent  years : 

Total  Receipts.  Receipts  per  Kilometer. 

Franca.  «    Francs. 

1857  311,608,012  45,259 

1858  835,289,016  41,898 

The  year  following  the  great  financial  crisis  exhibits,  thus,  a  larger 
receipt  than  that  by  which  it  had  been  preceeded.  —  Look  now  to  the 
receipts  of  the  first  half  of  the  two  past  years,  as  follows,  and  mark  the 
•great  increase  that  has  since  been  made  — 

Total  Receipts.  Receipts  per  Kilometer. 

Francs.  Francs. 

1858  148,955,578  19,305 

1859  181,095,064  20,699 

Compare,  I  pray  you,  my  dear  sir,  the  movement  thus  indicated  with 
that  exhibited  among  ourselves  in  the  past  three  years,  and  you  will 
have  little  difficulty  in  comprehending  why  it  is,  that  our  railroad  com- 
panies, like  our  farmers  and  manufacturers,  our  miners  and  our  ship- 
owners, are  now  being  ruined  —  the  $1200,000,000  expended  in  their 
construction  having  at  this  moment  a  market  value  that  can  scarcely  ex- 
ceed, even  if  it  equal,  $400,000,000. 

Looking  at  all  these  facts,  is  it  not  certain,  my  dear  sir,  — 

That  the  free  trade  system  of  which  you  are  the  advocate  is  one  of 
universal  discord  ? 

That,  it  tends  to  the  involvement  of  men  of  all  pursuits  in  life,  and 
of  the  Union  itself,  in  one  great  and  universal  ruin  ?  And,  therefore, 

That  it  is  to  the  interest  of  the  railroad  proprietor  to  unite  with  the 
farmer  in  promoting  the  adoption  of  measures  having  for  their  object 
the  development  of  our  mineral  wealth,  the  creation  of  a  real  agricul- 
ture, and  the  extension  of  domestic  commerce? 

Hoping  for  replies  to  these  questions,  and  ready  to  give  them  cir- 
culation among  millions  of  protectionist  readers,  I  remain,  with  much 
respect,  Yours,  very  truly, 

HENRY  C.  CAREY. 
W.  C.  BBYANT,  ESQ. 

PHILADELPHIA,  February  20,  1860. 


10  FINANCIAL  CRISES: 


LETTER    NINTH. 

From  the  Evening  Post,  Tuesday,  February  21st. 

"As  ATTEMPT  TO  REVIVE  AN  OLD  ABUSE.  —  It  is  intimated,  we  know  not  on 
•what  authority,  that  the  Committee  of  Ways  and  Means  are  about  to  report  a  bill 
to  the  House  of  Representatives,  with  the  view  of  carrying  into  effect  Mr.  Bucha- 
nan's recommendation  to  return  to  the  old  system  of  specific  duties. 

"If  this  be  so,  our  aged  President,  who  has  been  worrying  about  specific  duties 
ever  since  he  took  the  Executive  chair,  will  undoubtedly  enjoy  a  slight  sense  of 
relief.  For  our  part,  we  should  be  perfectly  willing  to  see  him  gratified  in  this 
respect,  if  the  measure  suggested  did  not  imply  an  impeachment  of  the  good  sense 
of  the  committee  by  whom  the  bill  is  said  to  be  preparing,  and  if  the  return  to 
specific  duties  were  not  simply  a  device  to  increase  the  burdens  of  the  people. 
The  mill-owners  are  not  satisfied  with  their  profits;  they  do  not  make  money 
enough  by  selling  their  merchandize,  and  they  call  for  specific  duties  to  enable 
them  to  extract  a  more  liberal  revenue  from  those  with  whom  they  deal. 

"  This  is  the  plain  English  of  the  clamor  for  specific  duties.  The  consumers  do 
not  want  them,  do  not  ask  for  them,  are  satisfied  with  the  present  method  of  col- 
lecting the  duties  by  a  percentage  on  the  value  of  the  goods  imported;  the  only 
change  they  wish  for  is  that  the  duties  should  be  made  lighter.  Only  the  frater- 
nity of  mill-owners,  shareholders  in  manufacturing  corporations,  capitalists  who 
are  anxious,  as  all  capitalists  naturally  are,  to  make  what  they  possess  more  pro- 
ductive than  it  now  is,  ask  for  the  imposition  of  specific  duties.  They  have  not 
the  faoe  to  ask  for  a  direct  increase  of  the  duties  as  they  now  stand ;  they  are 
afraid  to  demand  that  a  tax  of  fifteen  per  cent  on  imported  merchandize  shall  be 
raised  to  twenty  per  cent,  or  a  duty  of  twenty  to  one  oft  twenty-five  or  thirty. 
The  country  would  cry  shame  on  any  such  change.  They,  therefore,  get  at  the 
same  thing  indirectly;  they  wrap  up  the  increase  of  taxation  in  the  disguise  of 
specific  duties ;  the  consumer  is  made  to  pay  more,  but  being  made  to  pay  it 
under  the  name  of  specific  duties,  the  increase  is  of  such  a  nature  that  it  will  be 
apparent  only  to  an  expert  mercantile  calculator.  The  consumer  finds  that  the 
commodity  he  needs  bears  a  higher  price,  but  he  is  mystified  by  the  system  of 
specific  duties,  and  does  not  know  that  the  increase  of  price  is  a  tribute  which  he' 
is  forced  to  pay  to  the  mill-owners. 

"  That  class  of  men  who  own  our  manufacturing  establishments  have  had  pos- 
session of  the  legislative  power  of  the  country  long  enough.  It  is  quite  time  that 
the  committees  of  Congress,  and  those  who  vote  on  the  schemes  laid  before  them 
by  those  committees,  should  begin  to  consult  the  wishes  of  the  people.  It  is  high 
time  that  they' should  begin  to  ask,  not  what  will  satisfy  the  owners  of  forges, 
and  foundries,  and  coal-mines,  and  cotton-mills,  and  woollen-mills,  but  what  is 
just  and  fair  to  those  who  use  the  iron,  and  warm  their  habitations  with  the  coal, 
and  wear  the  woollens  and  the  cottons.  This  is  not  done  ;  the  lords  of  the  mills 
spetik  through  the  mouth  of  the  President  of  the  Republic  and  call  for  specific 
duties,  and  now  we  are  told  that  they  are  dictating  a  bill  to  the  Committee  of 
Ways  and  Means. 

"Great  apprehensions  have  been  entertained  by  many  persons,  both  here  and 
abroad,  lest  minorities  should  be  oppressed  in  our  country  by  unjust  laws  passed 
in  obedience  to  the  demand  of  the  mass  of  the  people.  We  received,  not  long 
since,  a  letter  from  England,  rn  which  great  anxiety  was  expressed  lest  this  should 
lead  to  the  downfall  of  our  government.  Hitherto,  however,  the  people  in  this 
country  have  been  oppressed  by  powerful  and  compact  minorities.  Laying  aside 
the  fact  that  small  classes  of  men,  united  by  a  very  perfect  mutual  understanding, 
and  wielding  large  capitals,  too  often  domineer  in  our  State  legislatures,  it  is 


THEIR   CAUSES   AND   EFFECTS.  41 

certain  that  the  revenue  laws  of  this  country  have,  for  many  years  past,  heen 
framed  by  a  minority.  The  mill-owners  have  dictated  the  whole  system  of  indi- 
rect taxation,  ever  since  the  last  war  with  Great  Britain,  and  the  utmost  we  have 
heen  able  to  obtain  in  the  struggle  against  their  supremacy  has  been  some  miti- 
gation, some  relaxation  of  the  protective  system  —  never  a  complete  release  from 
it.  The  oligarchy  of  slaveholders,  scarcely  more  numerous  than  that  of  the  mill- 
owners,  and  -equally  bound  together  by  a  common  interest  and  concerted  plans 
of  action,  have  held  the  principal  public  offices,  interpreted 'the  laws,  and  swayed 
the  domestic  policy  of  the  country  with  a  more  and  more  rigorous  control  for 
many  years  past.  We  are  engaged  in  a  struggle  with  that  oligarchy  now;  but  we 
have  no  idea  of  allowing  the  other  oligarchy  of  mill-owners,  while  we  are  thus 
engaged,  to  step  in  and  raise  the  tribute-money  we  pay  them  to  the  old  rates. 
What  we  have  wrested  from  their  tenacious  grasp  we  shall  keep,  if  possible. 

"  Other  governments  are  breaking  the  fetters  which  have  restrained  their 
peaceful  intercourse  with  each  other,  and  adopting  a  more  enlightened  system -r- 
a  system  which  is  the  best  and  surest  pledge  of  enduring  amity  and  peace  between 
nations.  England  and  France  are  engaged  in  putting  an  end  to  the  illiberal  and 
mutually  mischievous  prohibitive  system  in  their  commerce  with  each  other.  It 
will  dishonor  us  in  the  eyes  of  the  civilized  worfd  if  we,  who  boast  of  the  freedom 
of  our  institutions  and  the  wisdom  of  our  legislation,  should  in  the  meantime  be 
seen  picking  up  the  broken  fetters  of  that  system,  and  putting  them  into  the 
hands  of  artisans  at  Washington  to  forge  them  again  into  handcuffs  for  our  wrists. 
If  any  such  bill  as  is  threatened  should  be  introduced  into  Congress  by  the  Com- 
mittee of  Ways  and  Means,  we  trust  that  the  Republicans  of  the  Western  States 
will  be  ready  to  assist  in  giving  it  its  death-blow.  If  it  do  not  meet  its  quietus 
from  them,  it  will  probably  be  rejected,  as  it  will  richly  deserve,  in  the  Senate, 
and  Mr.  Buchanan  will  never  have  the  satisfaction  of  giving  it  his  signature." 

DEAR  SIR  : — You  have  been  invited  to  lay  before  your  readers  the 
arguments  in  favor  of  such  a  change  in  our  commercial  policy  as  shtould 
tend  to  produce  diversification  in  the  demand  for  human  service, 
thereby  increasing  .the  power  of  association  and  the  productiveness  of 
labor,  while'  relieving  our  farmers  from  a  tax  of  transportation  ten  times 
more  oppressive  than  all  the  taxes  required  for  the  support  of  European 
fleets  and  armies  —  that  invitation  having  been  given  in  the  hope  that 
by  its  acceptance  you  would  make  manifest  your  willingness  to  permit 
your  readers  to  see  both  sides  —  your  entire  confidence  in  the  accuracy 
of  the  economical  doctrines  of  which  you  have  been  so  long  the  earnest 
advocate  —  and  your  disposition  to  espouse  the  cause  of  truth,  on  what- 
soever side  she  might  be  found.  That  you  should  have  failed  to  do  this 
has  been  to  me  a  cause  of  much  regret,  having  hoped  better  things  of 
a  lover  of  freedom  like  yourself.  Resolved,  however,  that  my  readers 
sflall  have  full  opportunity  to  judge  for  themselves,  I  now,  as  you  see, 
place  within  the  reach  of  the  great  mass  of  the  protectionists  of  the 
Union,  the  reply  that  you  have  just  now  published,  si-ncerely  hoping 
that  they  may  give  to  it  the  most  careful  study,  and  thus  enable  them- 
selves to  form  a  correct  estimate  of  the  sort  of  arguments  usually  adduced 
in  support  of  that  British  free  trade  policy  which  has  for  its  object  the 
limitation  of  our  farmers  to  a  single  and  distant  market  for  their  products 
—  the  maintenance  of  the  existing  terrific  tax  of  transportation  —  and 
the  ultimate  reduction  of  our  whole  people  to  that  state  of  colonial 
dependence  from  which  we  were  rescued  by  the  men  who  made  the 
revolution. 

As  presented  by  me,  the  question  we  are  discussing  is  not  of  the 
prices  of  cotton-  goods,  but  of  human  freedom,  and  in  that  light  it 


42  FINANCIAL  CRISES: 

is  that.  I  have  begged  you  should  consider  it.  In  support  of  that 
view,  I  have  urged  upon  your  consideration  the  facts,  that  every  British 
free  trade  period  has  closed  with  one  of  those  fearful  crises  whose 
sad  effects  you  have  so  well  depicted ;  that  crises  have  been  followed 
by  paralyses  of  the  domestic  commerce,  destroying  the  demand  for 
labor ;  and  that,  as  a  necessary  consequence,  each  such  period  has  been 
marked,  on  one  side,  by  a  great  increase  in  the  number  of  millionaires, 
and  on  the  other,  by  such  a  growth  of  pauperism  that  that  terrible  dis- 
ease appears  now,  to  use  your  own  words,  "  like  the  Canadian  thistle,  to 
have  settled  on  our  soil,  and  to  have  germinated  with  such  vigor,  as  to 
defy  all  half  measures  to  eradicate  it."  Further,  you  have  been  asked 
to  look  to  the  facts,  that  the  reverse  of  all  this  has  been  experienced  in 
every  period  of  the  protective  system — domestic  commerce  having  then 
grown  rapidly,  with  constant  increase  in  the  demand  for  labor,  and  as 
constant  augmentation  in  the  regularity  of  the  societary  action,  in  the 
freedom  and  happiness  of  our  people,  in  the  strength  of  the  government, 
and  in  the  confidence  of  the  world,  both  at  home  and  abroad,  in  the 
stability  of  our  institutions.  Such  is  the  view  that  has  been  presented 
to  you,  in  the  hope  and  belief  that  to  a  lover  of  freedom  like  yourself 
it  would  be  one  of  the  highest  interest,  and  that  it  would  be  met  and 
considered  in  a  manner  worthy  of  a  statesman  and  a  Christian.  Has  it 
been  so  considered  ?  To  an  examination  of  that  question  I  shall  now 
ask  your  attention,  reserving  for  a  future  letter  the  consideration  of  the 
effects  of  the  advalorem  system  in  producing  those  financial  crises  whose 
terrible  effects  you  have  so  well  depicted,  and  that  pauperism  and  crime 
whose  growth  you  have  so  much  deplored. 

The  experience  of  the  outer  world  is  in  full  accordance  with  our  own, 
the  whole  proving  that  the  tendency  toward  harmony,  peace,  and  freedom, 
exists  in  the  direct  ratio  of  the  diversity  in  the  demand  for  human  force, 
and  consequent  power  of  combination  among  the  men  of  whom  society 
is  composed.  Therefore  is  it,  that  the  most  distinguished  economists  are 
found  uniting  in  the  idea  expressed  by  M.  Chevalier,  the  free  trader 
whom  you  so  much  admire,  that  it  is  only  "  the  accomplishment  of  a 
positive  duty"  on  the  part  of  governments,  so  to  direct  their  measures 
as  to  facilitate  the  taking  possession  of  all  the  various  branches  of  indus- 
try for  which  the  country  has  been  by  nature  suited.  Such  must  be  the 
view  of  every  real  statesman  —  recognizing,  as  such  men  must,  the 
existence  of  a  perfect  harmony  in  the  great  and  permanent  interests  of 
all  the  various  portions  of  society,  laborers  and  capitalists,  producers 
and  consumers,  farmers  and  manufacturers.  Of  such  harmony,  however, 
you  give  your  readers  none— rconsumers  of  cloth  and  iron  here  being  told 
that  capitalists  "  not  satisfied  with  their  profits"  are  anxious  to  "  increase 
the  burdens  of  the  people  j"  that  "  the  fraternity  of  mill-owners,"  and 
they  alone,  are  anxious  for  a  change  of  system,  with  increase  of  taxes ; 
that  "  the  lords  of  the  mills"  are  dictating  to  the  Committee  of  Ways  and 
Means ;  that  "  mill-owners  have  dictated  the  whole  system  of  indirect 
taxation  j"  and  that  it  is  high  time  for  them  now  to  protest  against  the 
further  maintenance  or  extension  of  the  system.  Here,  as  everywhere, 
you  are  found  in  alliance  with  that  Britisn  free  trade  system  which 
seeks  the  production  of  discord,  and  discord  and  slavery  march  always 
hand  in  hand  together  through  the  world. 


THEIR   CAUSES   AND   EFFECTS.  43 

Allow  me  now,  my  dear  sir,  to  ask  you  if  you  really  believe  that  the 
facts  are  such  as  they  here  are  said  to  be?  Do  you  not,  as  well  as 
myself,  know,  that  for  years  past,  the  wealthy  mill  owners  of  New 
England  have  been  opposed  to  any  change  of  system  that  could,  by 
giving  increased  protection,  tend  to  augment  domestic  competition  for 
the  sale  of  cloth,  knowing,  as  they  did,  that  such  competition  must  de- 
crease the  cost  of  cloth  to  the  consumer.  §0  is  it  now,  with  the  wealthy 
iron  master.  He  can  live,  though  all  around  him  may  be  crushed  by 
British  competition;  and  then,  in  common  with  his  wealthy  British 
rivals,  he  must  profit  by  the  destruction  they  have  made.  Such  being 
the  facts,  and  that  they  are  so  I  can  positively  assert,  are  you  not,  by 
opposing  protective  measures,  aiding  in  the  creation  among  ourselves  of 
a  little  "  oligarchy  of  mill  owners,"  whose  power  to  increase  the  "tribute 
money"  of  which  you  so  much  complain,  results  directly  from  the  failure 
of  Congress  so  to  act  as  to  increase  domestic  competition  for  the  sale 
of  cloth  and  iron  ?  The  less  that  competition,  the  less  must  be  the  re- 
ward of  labor,  and  the  larger  the  profits  of  the  capitalist,  but  the  greater 
must  be  the  tendency  towards  pauperism  and  crime,  and  the  less  the 
power  to  consume  either  cloth  or  iron. 

"  Hitherto,"  as  you  here  tell  your  readers,  our  people  "  have  been 
oppressed  by  powerful  and  compact  minorities."  In  this  you  are  right 
— a  small  minority  of  voters  in  the  Southern  States  having  dictated  the 
repeal  of  the  protective  tariffs  of  1828  and  1842,  and  having  now,  with 
a  single  and  brief  exception,  dictated  for  thirty  years  both  the  foreign 
and  domestic  policy  of  this  country.  In  1840,  however,  the  free  people 
of  our  Northern  States,  farmers,  mechanics,  laborers,  and  miners  —  the 
men  who  had  labor  to  sell  and  knew  that  it  commanded  better  prices 
in  protective  than  in  free  trade  times  —  rose  in  their  might  and  hurled 
from  power  this  little  "  oligarchy"  of  slave  owners,  then  taking  for  them- 
selves the  protection  which  they  felt  they  so  greatly  needed.  That  it 
is,  which  they  now  seek  again  to  do  — desiring  once  again  to'free  them- 
selves from  the  control  of  that  "powerful  and  compact  minority"  of 
slaveholders,  under  whose  iron  rule  they  so  long  have  suffered. 

Permit  me  now,  my  dear  sir,  to  ask  on  what  side  it  was  you  stood,  in 
the  great  contest  of  1842  ?  Was  it  with  the  poor  farmer  of  the  North 
who  sought  emancipation  from  the  tax  of  transportation,  by  the  creation 
of  a  domestic  market  for  his  products  ?  Was  it  with  the  mechanic  who 
sought  the  re-opening  of  the  shop  in  which  he  so  long  had  wrought  ? 
Was  it  with  the  laborer  whose  wife  and  children  were  perishing  for  want 
of  food  ?  "  Was  it  with  the  little  shopkeeper  who  found  his  little  capital 
disappearing  under  demands  for  the  payment  of  usurious  interest  ?  Was 
it  not,  on  the  contrary,  with  that  "  little  oligarchy"  of  men  who  owned 
the  laborers  they  employed,  and  opposed  the  protective  policy,  because 
it  looked  to  giving  the  laborer  increased  control  over  the  products  of 
his  labor  ?  Was  it  not  with  the  rich  capitalist  who  desired  that  labor 
might  be  cheap,  and  money  dear  ?  Was  it  not  with  those  foreign 
capitalists  who  desired  that  raw  materials  might  be  low  in  price,  and 
cloth  and  linen  high  ?  Was  it  not  with  those  British  statesmen  who  find 
in  the  enormous  capitals  of  English  iron  masters  "the  most  potent  in- 
struments of  warfare  against  the  competing  industry  of  other  countries  "  ? 
To  all  these  questions  the  answers  must  be  in  the  affirmative,  your 


44  FINANCIAL  CRISES: 

journal  having  then  stood  conspicuous  among  the  advocates  of  pro- 
slavery  domination  over  the  free  laborers  of  the  Northern  States..— 

We  have  now  another  free  trade  period,  when  crisis  has  been  followed 
by  paralysis,  and  it  may,  my  dear  sir,  be  not  improper  to  inquire  on  what 
side  it  is  that  you  now  are  placed.  Is  it  by  the  side  of  the  free  laborer 
who  is  perishing  because  of  inability  to  sell  his  labor  ?  Is  it  by  that 
of  the  poor  farmer  of  the  West,  who  finds  himself  compelled  to  pay  five 
per  cent,  per  month,  to  the  rich  capitalist  ?  Is  it  by  that  of  the  unem- 
ployed mechanic  of  the  Middle  and  Northern  States  ?  Is  it  by  that  of 
the  farmer  whose  land  diminishes  in  value  because  of  the  enormous  'tax 
of  transportation  to  which  he  is  subjected  ?  7s  it  not,  on  the  contrary, 
by  the  side  of  that  "  little  oligarchy"  which  holds  to  the  belief  that  the 
laborer  is  "  the  mud-sill"  of  society,  that  slavery  for  the  white  man  and 
the  black  is  the  natural  order  of  things,  and  that  "free  society  has 
proved  a  failure  "  ?  For  an  answer  to  these  questions,  allow  me  now  to 
point  you  to  the  fact  that  you  have  here  invoked  the  aid  of  a  Senate, 
the  control  of  which  is  entirely  in  the  hands  of  that  same  "  oligarchy," 
for  resisting  any  and  every  change  in  our  commercial  policy  asked  for 
by  the  farmers  and  laborers  of  the  Northern  States.  Now,  as  for  thirty 
years  past,  your  opponents  are  found  among  the  men  who  sell  their  own 
labor,  while  your  chief  allies  are  found  in  the  ranks  of  those  by  whom 
such  men  are  classed  as  serfs.  Need  we  wonder,  then,  that  your  journal 
should  be  always  advocating  the  cause  of  the  millionaires,  and  thus 
helping  to  augment  the  pauperism  and  crime  whose  rapid  growth  you 
so  much  lament  ? 

The  facts  being  thus  so  entirely  the  reverse  of  what  you  have  stated 
them  to  be,  is  it  not,  my  dear  sir,  most  remarkable  — 

That,  after  aiding,  during  so  long  a  period,  in  the  establishment  of 
pro-slavery  domination  over  our  domestic  and  foreign  commerce,  you 
should  now  venture  to  assert,  that  "  the  mill  owners  have  dictated  the 
whole  system  of  indirect  taxation,  ever  since  the  late  war  with  Great 
Britain  "  ? 

That,  the  necessity  for  resorting  to  such  mis-statements  does  not  furnish 
you  with  proof  conclusive  of  the  exceeding  weakness  of  the  cause  in 
support  of  which  you  are  engaged  ? 

That,  regard  for  truth  does  not  prompt  you  to  a  re-examination  of  the 
question,  with  a  view  to  satisfying  yourself  that  of  all  the  pro-slavery 
advocates,  the  Journal  of  Commerce  not  excepted,  there  is  not  even  a 
single  one  that  has  proved  more  efficient  than  yourself? 

Hoping  that  you  may  follow  my  example  by  giving  this  letter  a 
place  in  your  columns,  and  ready  to  place  within  the  reach  of  millions 
of  protectionist  readers,  whatever  answer  you  may  see  fit  to  make,  I 
remain,  Yours,  very  respectfully, 

HENRY  C.  CAREY. 
W.  C.  BRYANT,  ESQ. 

PHILADELPHIA,  February  28,  1860. 


THEIR  CAUSES   AND   EFFECTS.  45 


LETTER    TENTH. 

DEAR  SIR.  —  Allow  me  to  beg  that  you  now  review  with  me  some 
of l  the  facts  that  thus  far  have  been  presented  for  your  consideration., 
having  done  which,  I  will  ask  you  to  say  if  in  the  annals  of  the  world 
there  can  anywhere  be  found  a  more  admirable  contrivance  for  the  anni- 
hilation of  domestic  commerce  than  that  which  exists  among  ourselves, 
consequent  upon  the  adoption  of  British  free  trade  doctrines.  Closing 
our  mills  and  furnaces,  the  government  compels  our  people  to  seek  the 
West.  There  arrived,  they  find  themselves  taxed  for  transportation  to  such 
extent  that  not  only  have  they  no  power  to  develop  the  mineral  wealth 
that  so  much  abounds,  but  are  wholly  unable  even  to  construct  roads  by 
means  of  which  to  go  to  the  distant  market.  Few  in  number  and  poor, 
they  are  driven  to  seek  relief  at  the  hands  of  their  British  friends,  or 
masters,  pledging  their  lands  and  houses  as  security  for  the  payment  of 
railroad  bonds.  In  due  season,  the  foreign  creditor  becomes  owner  of 
the  road,  anxious  to  increase  his  revenue,  but,  above  all,  anxious  to 
promote  the  dispersion  of  our  people,  and  to  secure  the  maintenance  of 
our  existing  colonial  dependence.  Seeking  to  accomplish  that  object, 
he  taxes  your  farmers  for  the  transportation  of  the  produce  of  distant 
lands  —  compelling  them  to  make  good  all  the  losses  resulting  from 
cheaply  carrying  the  products  of  Wisconsin  and  Minnesota.  Thus  de- 
stroying the  value  of  the  land  and  labor  of  Atlantic  States,  he  compels 
a  further  emigration,  and  thus  on  and  on  he  goes  —  fully  carrying  out 
the  British  plan  of  recolonization,  while  always  lauding  the  advantages 
to  be  derived  from  the  British  free  trade  system.  It  is  a  remarkably 
ingenious  arrangement,  and  the  more  you  study  it,  the  more,  my  dear 
sir,  you  must  be  led  to  wonder  at  the  folly  of  our  people  in  having  so 
long  submitted  to  it.  The  British  people  are '  somewhat  heavily  taxed, 
but  for  every  dollar  they  pay  for  the  support  of  their  own  system,  do 
not  our  people  pay  ten  for  the  support  of  foreiyn  people  and  foreign 
governments  ? 

That  the  strength  of  a  community  grows  as  its  internal  commerce 
increases,  and  declines  as  that  commerce  decays,  is  proved  by  the  history 
of  every  nation  of  the  world.  Such  being  the  case,  allow  me  to  ask  you 
now  to  look  with  me  into  that  commerce  among  ourselves,  with  a  view 
to  determining  its  extent.  How  much  does  Kentucky  exchange  with 
Missouri  ?  What  is  the  annual  value  of  the  commerce  of  Ohio  with 
Indiana,  or  of  Virginia  with  Kentucky?  Scarcely  more,  as  I  imagine, 
than  that  of  a  single  day's  labor  of  their  respective  populations ;  and, 
perhaps,  not  even  half  so  much. — Why  is  this  the  case?  Is  it  not 
a  necessary  consequence  of  the  absence  of  that  diversity  of  employ- 
ments within  the  States,  everywhere  ,  seen  to  be  so  indispensable  to 
the  maintenance  of  commerce?  Assuredly  it  is.  Ohio  and  Indiana 
have  little  more  than  one  pursuit  —  that  of  tearing  out  the  soil,  and  ex- 
porting it  in  the  form  of  food.  Virginia  and  Kentucky  sell  their  soil 


46  FINANCIAL  CRISES: 

in  the  forms  of  tobacco  and  of  corn.  Carolina  and  Alabama  have  the 
same  pursuits  j  and  so  it  is  throughout  by  far  the  larger  portion  of  the 
Union  —  millions  of  people  being  employed  in  one  part  of  it,  in  robbing 
the  earth  of  the  constituents  of  cotton,  while  in  others,  other  millions 
are  employed  in  plundering  the  great  treasury  of  nature,  of  the  constitu- 
ents of  wheat  and  rice,  corn  and  tobacco,  and  thus  destroying,  for  them- 
selves and  their  successors,  the  power  to  maintain  commerce. 

The"  commerce  of  State  with  State  is  thus,  as  you  see,  my  dear  sir, 
but  very  trivial ;  and  the  reason  why  it  is  so,  is,  that  the  commerce  of 
man  with  his  fellow-man,  within  the  States,  as  a  general  rule,  is  so  ex- 
ceedingly diminutive.  Were  the  people  of  Illinois  enabled  to  develop 
their  almost  boundless  deposits  of  coal  and  iron  ore,  and  thus  to  call  to 
their  aid  the  wonderful  power  of  steam,  the  internal  commerce  of  the 
State  would  grow  rapidly  —  making  a  market  at  home  for  the  food  pro- 
duced, and  enabling  its  producer  to  become  a  large  consumer  of  cotton 
Cotton  mills  then  growing  up,  bales  of  cotton  wool  would  travel  up  the 
Mississippi,  to  be  given  .in  exchange  for  the  iron  required  for  the  roads 
of  Arkansas  and  Alabama,  and  for  the  machinery  demanded  for  the  con- 
struction of  cotton  and  sugar  mills,  in  Texas  and  Louisiana. 

That,  however,  being  precisely  the  sort  of  commerce  which  Britain 
so  much  dreads,  and  that,  too,  which  our  own  government  desires  to 
destroy,  the  capitalist  feels  no  confidence  in  any  road  dependent  upon  its 
growth,  whether  for  the  payment  of  interest  upon  its  bonds,  or  dividends 
jpon  its  stock.  Hence  the  almost  entire  impossibility  of  obtaining  the 
means  of  making  any  road  that  does  not  lead  directly  to  Liverpool  and 
Manchester.  Look  with  me,  I  pray  you,  into  the  Report  just  now  pub- 
lished, of  the  Sunbury  and  Erie  Railroad  —  running,  as  it  does,  through 
a  country  abounding  in  mineral  wealth  and  fertile  lands.  Its  length 
is  288  miles,  248  of  which  are  already  made,  and  148'  completed  by 
the  laying  of  the  iron  —  the  expenditure  having  somewhat  exceeded 
$8,500,000.  There,  however,  the  work  stops,  it  being  quite  impossible 
to  obtain,  even  as  a  temporary  loan,  either  at  home  or  abroad,  the  trivial 
sum  that  is  yet  required,  except  at  the  cost  of  sacrifices  that  must  be 
ruinous  to  those  who  have  commenced  the  work.  Until  it  shall  be 
obtained,  the  capital  already  expended  must  fail  to  be  productive,  and 
lands  equal  in  extent  to  a  moderate  German  kingdom,  .must  fail  to  con- 
tribute to  the  maintenance  of  our  people,  and  to  the  increase  of  the 
States  in  wealth,  strength,  and  power. 

Thirty  years  since,  Germany  did  as  we  are  doing,  exporting  raw  ma- 
terials, and  importing  finished  products.  Adopting  protection,  she  has 
placed  herself  in  a  position  to  compete  with  Britain  for  the  purchase  of 
wool  and  cotton,  and  for  the  export  of  knives  and  cloth.  Then  she  was 
poor,  but  now  she  is  so  rich  that  her  people  take  from  us  bonds  by 
which  our  roads  and  lands  are  bound  for  the  payment  of  rates  of  inte- 
rest so  enormous  as  to  ruin  the  persons  whose  property  has  been  pledged. 
— Thirty  years  since,  we  paid  off  all  our  foreign  debts.  Adopting  free 
trade  measures,  we  have  since  created  a  foreign  debt  that  requires  for 
payment  of  its  interest  alone,  more  than  the  products  of  all  our  farms 
that  go  to  Europe.  Then,  we  were  rich  and  strong.  Now,  we  appear 
as  beggars  for  loans  in  every  money  market  of  Europe,  and  are  fast  be- 
coming the  very  paupers  of  the  world. 


THEIR   CAUSES   AND   EFFECTS.  47 

That  our  system  tends  to  the  destruction  of  domestic  commerce  in  the 
Atlantic  States,  is  beyond  a  question.  How  it  affects  the  value  of  land 
and  labor  throughout  those  Western  States,  in  whose  favor  you  now 
appeal  to  your  Legislature,  asking  for  a  continuance  of  the  system  by 
moans  of  which  the  New  York  farmer  is  made  to  pay  the  cost  of  trans- 
porting the  corn  and  wheat  of  his  Western  competitor,  we  may  now 
inquire. 

Ten  years  since,  Congress  created  in  Illinois  a  great  company  of  land- 
lords —  granting  many  millions  of  acres  of  land,  coupled  with  the  obli- 
gation to  construct  a  road  from  north  to  south,  across  the  State.  Two 
years  later,  an  ex-Secretary  of  the  Treasury,  author  of  the  tariff  of  1846, 
was  found  in  London,  engaged  in  peddling  off  the  Company's  stock  and 
bonds.  While  there,  he  published  a  book,  setting  forth  the  fact  that 
Illinois  abounded  in  rich  soils,  and  in  coal  and  ores,  and  proving  that 
the  land  alone  would  pay  for  making  a  road  that  was  to  cost,  according 
to  my  recollection,  some  fifteen  or  twenty  millions  of  dollars — the  whole 
of  which  must,  therefore,  be  clear  profit  to  the  stockholders.  Eventually, 
the  bait  was  swallowed,  and  the  result  exhibits  itself  in  the  fact  that 
Mr.  Cobden  has  been  a  ruined  man  —  having  been  led  by  his  free  trade 
friends  to  invest  therein  the  whole  sum  of  $350,000  paid  to  him  by 
the  Manchester  manufacturers,  as  compensation  for  his  successful  efforts 
at  bringing  about  a  repeal  of  the  British  corn  laws,  and  of  our  protective 
tariff  of  1842. 

Why  is  this  ?  Why  is  it,  that  the  proprietors  of  so  many  millions  of 
acres,  and  of  a  road  crossing  so  many  beds  of  coal  arid  ores  of  various 
kinds,  are  ruined  men  ?  Because  the  road  runs  from  north  to  south, 
and  not  from  east  to  west,  and  cannot,  therefore,  be  made  a  part  of  any 
line  leading  through  New  York  to  Liverpool.  Because,  the  value  of 
the  land  depended  upon  the  development  of  domestic  commerce  —  that 
commerce  which  "  Britain  has  so  touch  cause  to  dread."  Had  the  tariff 
of  1842  continued  in  existence,  the  coal  of  Illinois  would  long  since  have 
been  brought  into  connection  with  the  lead,  iron,  and  copper  ores  of 
Missouri,  and  the  country  of  the  lakes,  and  with  the  cotton  of  the  South ; 
and  then,  all  the  promises  of  Mr.  Walker,  and  all  the  hopes  of  Mr. 
Cobden,  would  have  beeii  fully  realized.  Had,  however,  -that  tariff  been 
maintained,  the  people  of  Illinois  would  have  made  their  own  roads,  and 
the  country  would  have  been  spared  the  disgrace  of  having  ex-Cabinet 
ministers  engaged  in  the  effort  to  persuade  English  bankers  to  lend  the 
money  required  for  their  construction.  '  They  would  have  been  spared, 
too,  a  succession  of  financial  crises,  bringing  ruin  to  themselves,  while 
enabling  their  British  free- trade  friends  to  denounce  them,  in  common 
with  all  their  countrymen,  as  little  better  than  thieves  and  vagabonds. 

•The  less  our  domestic  commerce,  the  greater  is  our  dependence  upon 
Liverpool  and  Manchester,  and  the  less  our  power  to  construct  any  road 
that  does  not  lead  in  that  direction  —  the  general  rule  being,  that  north 
and  south  roads  can  never  be  made  to  pay.  Look  to  your  own  State, 
-crossed  by  two  railroads,  leading  through  your  city  to  Liverpool,  while 
your  people  are  being  heavily  taxed  for  an  enlargement  of  your  canals, 
which  has  for  its  only  object  an  increase  of  competition  on  the  part  of 
Western  farmers;  that  increase,  too,  established  at  the  very  moment 
when  your  railroad  owners  are  compelling  your  farmers  to  pay  all  the 


48  FINANCIAL  CRISES: 

losses  they  incur  in  carrying  Western  produce  at  less  than  the  mere 
cost  of  transportation.  Passing  south,  you  find  a  Pennsylvania  road, 
running  east  and  west,  to  compete  with  yours,  Maryland  and  Virginia 
roads  to  compete  with  all,  and  South  Carolina  and  Georgia  roads  in- 
tended to  do  the  same;  but  of  local  roads  you  find  almost  none  whatever. 
Why  is  this?  Because  Liverpool  is  becoming  more  and  more  the  centre 
of  our  system,  with  New  York  for  its  place  of  distribution.  Because  we 
are  fast  relapsing  into  a  state  of  colonization  even  more  complete  than 
that  which  existed  before  the  Revolution. 

For  the  moment,  your  city  profits  by  this  British  free  trade  policy, 
the  prices  of  lots  rising  as  the  taxation  of  farming  la»nds  augments, 
but,  is  it  quite  certain  that  her  services  will  always  be  required,  as  dis- 
tributer of  the  produce  of  British  looms  ?  May  it  not  be,  and  that, 
too,  at  no  distant  period,  that  Manchester  and  Cincinnati  will  find  it 
better  to  dispense  with  services  that  require  the  payment  of  such  enor- 
mous sums  as  are  now  required  for  the  maintenance  of  so  many  thousands 
of  expensive  families,  the  use  of  so  many  costly  warehouses,  and  the 
payment  of  such  enormous  rates  of  interest  ?  The  Grand  Trunk  Road 
has  already,  as  we  are  told  by  the  Daily  Times, 

"  Seized  upon  our  Western  carrying  trade?  and  linked  Chicago  and  Cincinnati 
to  Portland  and  Boston  by  the  way  of  Canada,  and  on  terms  which  almost  defy 
competition  from  the  trunk  lines  of  Maryland,  Pennsylvania,  and  New  York. 
They  are  delivering  flour  and  grain  in  New  England,  and  both  domestic  and 
foreign  merchandize  in  Ohio  and  Illinois,  cheaper  than  they  can  be  profitably 
transported  via  Philadelphia,  or  New  York,  or  Albany.  Not  content  with  this, 
they  have  entered  into  competition  with  our  coasting-trade  from  the  Gulf  to  the 
East,  and,  using  that  other  Anglo-American  enterprise  just  alluded  to,  the  Illinois 
Central,  are  delivering  cotton  from  Memphis  to  the  New  England  factories 
cheaper  and  with  more  expedition  than  it  can  be  forwarded  by  the  Mississippi 
River  to  New  Orleans,  and  thence  by  sea  to  New  York  and  Boston.  Nor  have 
they  been  unmindful  of  their  own  direct  steam  communication  with  England  fram 
Quebec  and  Portland — the  last-named  point  being  converted  into  a  mart  of  British- 
American  commerce  by  reason  of  the  perpetual  lease  or  virtual  ownership  by  the 
Grand  Trunk  Company  of  the  Atlantic  and  St.  Lawrence  Eailway  from  Portland 
to  the  Victoria  Bridge.  They  are  now  using  the  Quebec  line  of  screw  steamers, 
already  one  of  the  most  successful  between  England  and  this  continent,  for  de- 
livering produce  from  Cincinnati  and  Chicago  at  Liverpool  in  twenty  days  !  —  to 
•which  end  they  issue  their  own  responsible  bills  of  lading  in  the  West  through  to 
Liverpool.  A  sample  of  this  operation  may  be  seen  in  Wall  Street  almost  any  day 
attached  to  sterling  bills  of  exchange  made  against  breadstuffs  and  meat  and 
provisions  from  the  West  on  England.  And  it  is  by  no  means  certain  that  in 
another  year  the  cotton  of  Tennessee  and  North  Mississippi  will  not  be  made  to 
take  the  same  extraordinary  direction,  say  from  the  planting  States  to  Manchester 
through  Canada." 

Such  being  the  case  now,  at  the  end  of  fourteen  years  of  British  free 
trade,  what  will  it  be  ten  or  twenty  years  hence  ?  Arrangements  are 
already  on  foot  for  connecting  Southern  cities  with  Liverpool  by  means 
of  Portland,  while,  throughout  the  West,  the  managers  of  the  road 
"  have  not,"  as  we  are  farther  told, 

"  Failed  to  effect  the  needful  alliances  in  the  West,  to  make  the  connexions  at 
least  temporarily  complete.  The  Illinois  Central,  from  Cairo  to  Chicago,  is  their 
natural  ally  by  reason  of  its  English  proprietary,  and  they  bridge  the  peninsula 
of  Michigan  by  another  English  work,  the  Detroit  and  Milwaukee  Railway.  As 
this  last  connection  will  not  fully  answer  the  designs  of  the  company  on  the 


THEIR   CAUSES   AND   EFFECTS.  49 

winter  and  early  spring  trade  of  the  West,  while  the  lakes  are  closed,  it  is  not 
impossible  that  one  of  the  older  Michigan  roads  may  be  leased,  like  the  Atlantic 
and  St.  Lawrence,  or  a  controlling  interest  purchased  in  its  shares  and  mortgages. 
The  Michigan  Southern  has  been  named  in  this  connection,  because  of  its  present 
financial  embarrassments,  which  have  cheapened  almost  to  a  nominal  value  its 
stock  and  bonds,  and  because,  too,  of  its  terminus  at  Toledo  as  well  as  Detroit ; 
the  former  point  being  essential  to  the  Cincinnati  connections  of  the  Grand 
Trunk." 

The  more  frequent  and  severe  our  financial  crises,  the  more  perfect 
must  become  the  control  of  British  traders  over  all  our  roads,  and  the 
greater  the  tendency  towards  diminution  in  the  necessity  for  profiting 
of  the  services  of  New  York  stores  and  New  York  merchants.  So,  at 
least,  it  seems  to  me. 

For  seven  years  past  we  have  talked  of  the  construction  of  a  road  to 
California,  but,  in  the  present  state  of  our  affairs,  becoming  poorer  and 
more  embarrassed  from  year  to  year,  it  is  quite  impossible  that  we  should 
ever  enter  upon  such  a  work.  The  wealth  and  power  of  Britain,  on  the 
contrary,  become  greater  from  day  to  day — all  her  colonies,  ourselves 
included,  being  compelled  to  add  to  the  value  of  her  land  and  labor, 
while  their  own  soils  become  more  and  more  impoverished,  and  their 
own  laborers  are  less  and  less  employed.  Let  our  existing  commercial 
policy  be  maintained,  and  we  shall  see  the  Grand  Trunk  Koad  extended 
to  the  Pacific  —  Portland  and  Quebec  becoming  the  agents  of  Liverpool 
and  Manchester,  and  taking  the  place  now  occupied  by  New  York. 

Looking  at  all  these  facts,  is  it  not  clear — 

That  all  our  tendencies  are  now  in  the  direction  of  colonial  vassalage  ? 

That,  as  your  city  has  grown  at  the  expense  of  others,  because  of  its 
proximity  to  Liverpool,  so  other  places,  furnishing  means  of  communica- 
tion that  are  more  direct,  may  profit  thereby  at  its  expense  ? 

That  as  Liverpool  has  taken  the  place  of  New  York  in  regard  to  ships, 
it  may  soon  do  so  in  regard  to  trade  ?  And  therefore, 

That  the  real  and  permanent  interests  of  your  city  are  to  be  promoted 
by  an  union  of  all  our  people  for  the  re-establishment  of  that  industrial 
independence  which  grew  so  rapidly  under  the  protective  tariffs  of  1828 
and  1842  ?— 

Begging  you  to  be  assured  of  my  continued  determination  to  give  to 
the  answers  you  may  make  to  these  questions,  the  widest  circulation 
among  protectionist  readers,  I  remain,  my  dear  sir, 

Yours,  very  truly, 

HENRY  C.  CAREY. 
W.  C.  BRYANT,  ESQ. 

PHILADELPHIA,  March  6,  1860. 


50  FINANCIAL  CRISES: 


LETTER    ELEVENTH. 

From  the  Evening  Post,  Tuesday,  Feb.  28. 

"AN  EXAMPLE  OF  THE  EFFECT  OF  PROTECTION. — Among  the  commodities  which 
have  hitherto  not  been  permitted  to  be  brought  into  France  from  foreign  countries 
is  cutlery.  It  is  now  included  in  the  list  of  merchandize  to  which  the  late  treaty 
with  Great  Britain  opens  the  ports  of  France. 

"  Those  who  have  made  a  comparison  of  French  cutlery  with  the  cutlery  of  the 
British  islands  must  have  been  at  first  surprised  at  the  difference  in  the  quality. 
Nothing  can  exceed  the  perfection  of  workmanship  in  the  articles  turned  out  from 
the  workshops  of  Sheffield.  The  symmetry  and  perfect  adaptation  of  the  form, 
the  excellence  of  the  material,  the  freedom  from  flaws,  and  the  mirror-like  polish 
which  distinguish  them,  have  for  years  past  been  the  admiration  of  the  world. 
French  cutlery,  placed  by  its  side,  has  a  ruder,  rougher  appearance,  an  unfinished 
look,  as  if  the  proper  tools  were  wanting  to  the  artisan,  or  as  if  it  was  the  product 
of  a  race  among  whom  the  useful  arts  had  made  less  progress. 

"  This  is  not  owing  to  any  parsimony  of  nature,  either  in  supplying  the  mate- 
rial to  be  wrought  or  the  faculties  of  the  artisan  who  brings  it  to  a  useful  shape. 
The  ores  of  the  French  mines  yield  metal  of  an  excellent,  quality,  and  the  French 
race  is  one  of  the  most  ingenious  and  dexterous  in  the  world.  In  all  manufac- 
tures requiring  the  nicest  precision  and  the  greatest  delicacy  of  workmanship  the 
French  may  be  said  to  excel  the  rest  of  mankind.  Out  of  the  most  unpromising 
and  apparently  intractable  materials  their  skilful  hands  fabricate  articles  of  use 
or  ornament  of  the  most  pleasing  and  becoming  forms.  What,  then,  is  the  reason 
that  their  cutlery  is  so  much  inferior  to  that  of  Great  Britain  ? 

"In  all  probability  the  reason  is  that  which  at  one  time  caused  the  silk  trade 
to  languish  in  Great  Britain,  which  at  one  time  made  the  people  of  the  same 
country  complain  that  their  glass  was  both  bad  in  quality  and  high  in  price.  In 
both  these  instances  the  competition  of  foreign  artisans  was  excluded  ;  the  British 
manufacturer  having  the  monopoly  of  the  market,  there  was  nothing  to  stimulate 
his  ingenuity;  he  produced  articles  of  inferior  quality,  his  vocation  did  not  flou- 
rish, and  both  he  and  the  community  were  dissatisfied.  So  with  regard  to  the 
cutlery  of  France,  the  difficulty  has  been  the  prohibition  of  the  foreign  article. 
Let  the  foreign  and  the  French  commodity  be  looked  at  side  by  side  for  a  few 
years  in  the  shop-windows  of  Paris,  if  the  duty  to  which  cutlery  is  still  to  be 
subject  will  permit  it,  and  we  think  we  may  venture  to  pledge  ourselves  that  the 
French  workmen  will  show  themselves  in  due  time  no  way  behind  their  English 
rivals.  We  may  expect  the  same  result  to  take  place  which  has  so  much  aston- 
ished and  puzzled  the  friends  of  protection  in  Sardinia,  where  the  removal  of 
prohibitions  and  protective  duties  has  caused  a  hundred  different  branches  of 
manufacturing  industry  to  spring  to  sudden  and  prosperous  activity." 

DEAR  SIR:  —  Anxious  that  all  the  protectionists  of  the  Union 
should,  as  far  as  possible,  have  it  within  their  power  to  study  both  sides 
of  this  question,  I  here,  as  you  see,  lay  before  my  readers  your  latest 
argument  against  protection,  thereby  affording  them  that  opportunity 
of  judging  for  themselves  which  you  so  systematically  deny  to  the  readers 
of  the  Post.  Why  is  it  that  it  is  so  denied  ?  Is  it  that  the  British 
system  caa  be  maintained  in  no  other  manner  than  by  such  concealment 


THEIE   CAUSES   AND   EFFECTS.  51 

of  great  facts  as  is  here  so  clearly  obvious  ?  While  enlarging  upon  the 
deficiencies  of  French  cutlery,  as  resulting  from  protection,  was  it  neces- 
sary to  shut  out  from  view  the  important  fact,  that  under  a  protective 
system  more  complete,  and  more  steadily  maintained,  than  any  other  in 
the  world,  France  has  made  such  extraordinary  progress  in  all  textile 
manufactures,  that  she  now  exports  of  them  to  the  extent  of  almost  hun- 
dreds of  millions  of  dollars  annually — supplying  them  at  home  and 
abroad  so  cheaply,  that  she  finds  herself  now  ready  to  substitute  pro- 
tective duties  for  the  prohibitions  which  have  so  long  existed  ?  Would 
it  not  be  far  more  fair  and  honest  were,  you  to  give  your  readers  all  the 
facts,  instead  of  limiting  yourself  to  the  few  that  can  be  made  to  seem 
to  furnish  evidence  of  the  truth  of  that  system  to  which  you  are  so  much 
attached,  and  to  which  we  are  indebted  for  the  financial  crises  whose 
ruinous  efiects  you  have  so  well  described  ? 

Why  is  it  that  the  French  people,  while  so  successful  with  regard  to 
silks  and  cottons,  are  so  deficient  in  respect  to  the  production  and  manu- 
facture of  the  various  metals  ?  The  cause  of  this  is  not,  as  you  tell  your 
readers,  to  be  found  in  "  the  parsimony  of  nature,"  and  yet,  it  is  a  well- 
known  fact,  that  while  the  supply  of  coal  and  iron  ore  is  very  limited, 
others  of  the  most  useful  metals  are  not  to  be  found  in  France.  This, 
however,  is  not  all,  the  "parsimony  of  nature"  which,  notwithstanding 
your  denial  of  it,  so  certainly  exists,  being  here  accompanied  by  restric- 
tions on  domestic  commerce  of  the  most  injurious  kind,  an  account 
of  which,  from  a  work  of  the  highest  character,  will  be  found  in  the  fol- 
lowing paragraph : 

"  By  the  French  law,  all  minerals  of  every  kind  belong  to  the  crown,  and  the  only 
advantage  the  proprietor  of  the  toil  enjoys,  is,  to  have  the  refufal  of  the  mine  at  the 
rent  fixed  upon  it  by  the  crown  surveyors.  There  is  great  difficulty  sometimes  in 
even  obtaining  the  leave  of  the  crown  to  sink  a  shaft  upon  the  property  of  the  in- 
dividual who  is  anxious  to  undertake  the  speculation,  and  to  pay  the  rent  usually 
demanded,  a  certain  portion  of  the  gross  product.  The  Comte  Alexander  de  B 
has  been  vainly  seeking  this  permission  for  a  lead-mine  on  hit)  estate  in  Brittany 
for  upwards  of  ten  years." 

Having  read  this,  you  cannot  but  be  satisfied  that  it  accounts  most 
fully  for  French  deficiencies  in  the  mining  and  metallurgic  arts.  That 
such  was  the  case,  you  knew  at  the  time  you  wrote  your  article,  or  you- 
did  not  know  it.  If  you  did,  would  it  not  have  been  far  more  fair  and 
honest  to  have  given  all  the  facts  ?  If  you  did  not,  is  it  not  evident 
that  you  have  need  to  study  further,  before  undertaking  to  lecture  upon, 
questions  of  such  high  importance  ? 

Turning  now  from  French  cutlery  to  British  glass,  I  find  you  telling 
your  readers  that  the  deficiency  in  this  latter  had  been  "  in  all  proba- 
bility" due  to  the  fact,  that  "the  competition  of  foreign  artisans"  had 
been  so  entirely  excluded.  On  the  contrary,  my  dear  sir,  it  was  due  to 
restrictions  on  internal  commerce,  glass  having  been,  until  within  a  few 
years  past,  subjected  to  an  excise  duty,  yielding  an  annual  revenue  of 
more  than  $3,000,000.  To  secure  the  collection  of  that  revenue,  it  had 
been  found  necessary  to  subject  the  manufacturer  to  such  regulations 
in  reference  to  his  modes  of  operation  as  rendered  improvement  quite 
impossible.  From  the  moment  that  domestic  commerce  became  free, 


52  FINANCIAL   CRISES  : 

domestic  competition  grew,  bringing  with  it  the  great  changes  that  have 
since  occurred.  That  such  is  the  case,  is  known  to  all  the  world,  and  yet 
'Timd  no  mention  of  these  important  facts  in  this  article  intended  for  the 
readers  of  the  Post.  Would  they  not,  my  dear  sir,  be  better  instructed, 
were  you  to  permit  them  to  see  and  read  both  sides  of  this  great  question  ? 

"What  has  recently  been  done  with  British  glass,  is  precisely  what  was 
sought  to  be  done  in  France  by  Colbert  and  Turgot,  both  of  whom  saw 
in  the  removal  of  restrictions  upon  internal  commerce  the  real  road  to 
an  extended  intercourse  with  other  nations  of  the  world.  With  us,  the 
great  obstacle  standing  in  the  way  of  domestic  commerce,  is  found  in 
those  large  British  capitals  which,  as  we  are  now  officially  informed, 
constitute  "  the  great  instruments  of  warfare  against  the  competing 
capitals  of  other  countries,  and  are  the  most  essential  instruments  now 
remaining  by  which  the  manufacturing  supremacy"  of  England  "can 
be  maintained ;"  and  in  protecting  our  people  against  that  most  destruc- 
tive "  warfare,"  we  are  but  following  in  the  direction  indicated  by  the 
most  eminent  French  economists,  from  Colbert  to  Chevalier.  France 
has  protected  her  people,  and  therefore  is  it,  that  agricultural  products 
are  high  in  price,  while  finished  commodities  are  cheap,  and  that  the 
country  becomes  more  rich  and  independent  from  year  to  year.  We 
refuse  to  grant  protection,  and  therefore  do  we  sink  deeper  in  colonial 
vassalage  from  day  to  day. 

Foreign  competition  in  the  domestic  market  is,  however,  as  we  here 
are  told,  indispensable  to  improvement  in  the  modes  of  manufacture. 
This  being  really  so,  how  is  it,  my  dear  sir,  that  France  has  so  very 
much  improved  in  the  various  branches,  in  which  foreign  competition 
has  been  so  entirely  prohibited  P  How  is  it,  that  Belgium  and  Germany 
have  so  far  superseded  England  in  regard  to  woollen  cloths  ?  How  is  it, 
that  American  newspapers  have  so  much  improved,  while  being  cheap- 
ened ?  Have  not  these  last  an  entire  monopoly  of  the  home  market  ? 
Would  it  be  possible  to  print  a  Tribune,  or  a  Post,  in  England,  for  New 
York  consumption  ?  Perfectly  protected,  as  you  yourself  are,  is  it  not 
time  that  you  should  open  your  eyes  to  the  fact  that  it  is  to  the  stimula- 
tion of  domestic  competition  for  the  purchase  of  raw  materials,  and  for 
the  sale  of  finished  commodities,  we  must  look  for  any  and  every  increase 
in  the  wealth,  happiness,  and  freedom  of  our  people  ? 

The  more  perfect  the  possession  of  the  domestic  market,  the  greater 
is  the  power  to  supply  the  foreign  one  —  the  Tribune  being  enabled  to 
supply  its  distant  subscribers  so  very  cheaply,  for  the  reason  that  it  and 
its  fellows  have  to  fear  no  competition  for  home  advertisements  from 
the  London  Times,  or  Post.  "  This  principle,"  as  you  yourself  have 
most  truly  said, 

"Is  common  to  every  business.  Every  manufacturer  practises  it,  by  always 
allowing  the  purchaser  of  large  quantities  of  his  surplus  manufacture  an  advan- 
tage over  the  domestic  consumer,  for  the  simple  reason  that  the  domestic  con- 
sumer must  support  the  manufacturer,  and  as  the  quantity  of  goods  consumed  at 
home  \a  very  much  larger  than  that  sent  abroad,  it  is  the  habit  of  the  manufac- 
turer to  send  his  surplus  abroad,  and  sell  at  any  price,  so  as  to  relieve  the  market 
of  a  surplus  which  might  depress  prices  at  home,  and  compel  him  to  work  at  little 
or  no  profit." 


THEIR   CAUSES   AND   EFFECTS.  53 

Admitting  now  that  it  were  possible  for  the  London  Times  to  supply, 
on  every  evening,  a  paper  precisely  similar  to  yours — forcing  abroad  the 
surplus,  and  selling  "  at  any  price,  so  as  to  relieve  the  domestic  market," 
would  you  not  be  among  the  first  to  demand  protection  against  the 
system  ?  Would  you  not  assure  your  readers  of  the  entire  impossibility 
of  maintaining  competition  against  a  journal,  all  of  whose  expenses  of 
composition  and  editorship  were  paid  by  the  home  market  —  leaving  its 
proprietors  to  look  abroad  for  little  more  than  the  mere  cost  of  paper 
and  of  presswork  ?  Would  you  not  demonstrate  to  them  the  absolute  ne- 
cessity of  protecting  themselves  against  a  "  warfare  "  that  must  inevitably 
result  in  the  creation  of  a  "  little  oligarchy "  of  monopolists  who,  when 
domestic  competition  had  been  finally  broken  down,  would  compel  them 
to  pay  ten  cents  for  a  journal  neither  larger  nor  better  than  they  now 
obtain  for  two  ?  Assuredly,  you  would. 

Addressing  such  arguments  to  your  British  free  trade  friends,  they 
would,  however,  refer  you  to  the  columns  of  the  Post,  begging  you  to 
study  the  assurance  that  had  there  been  given,  that— . 

"  Whenever  the  course  of  financial  fluctuation  shall  have  broken  the  hold  of 
monopolists  and  speculators  upon  the  mines  of  iron  and  coal,  -which  the  Almighty 
made  for  the  common  use  of  man,  and  whenever  there  shall  be  men  of  skill  and 
enterprise  to  spare  to  go  into  the  business  of  iron-making  for  a  living,  and  not 
on  speculation,  who  shall  set  their  wits  at  it  to  find  out  the  best  ways  and  the 
cheapest  processes,  it  must  be  that  such  an  abundance  both  of  ore  and  fuel  can 
be  made  to  yield  plenty  of  iron,  in  spite  of  the  competition  of  European  iron- 
masters who  have  to  bring  their  products  three  thousand  miles  to  find  a 
market." 

To  all  this  you  would,  of  course,  reply,  that  "  financial  fluctuations  " 
created  monopolies,  and  never  "  broke  their  hold ; "  that  men  of  "  skill 
and  enterprise"  were  not  generally  rich  enough  to  compete  with  such 
rivals  as  the  London  Times;  that  domestic  competition  had  already 
given  us  "  cheaper  ways  and  cheaper  processes  "  than  any  other  country 
of  the  world ;  that  the  freight  of  a  sheet  of  paper  was  as  nothing  com- 
pared with  the  cost  of  editorship  and  composition;  that  all  these  latter 
costs  were,  in  the  case  of  the  British  journals,  paid  by  the  domestic 
market ;  that  "  the  domestic  consumers  supported  the  British  manufac- 
turer;" that  the  quantity  of  journals  consumed"  at  home  was  so  very 
great  that  their  producers  could  afford  to  sell  abroad  "  at  any  price " — 
thereby  "  relieving  the  market  of  a  surplus  which  might  depress  prices 
at  home,  and  compel  them  to  work  at  little  or  no  profit;"  and  that,  for  all 
these  reasons,  it  was  absolutely  necessary  to  grant  you  such  protection  as 
would  give  you  the  same  security  in  the  domestic  market  as  was  then 
enjoyed  by  your  foreign  rivals  ? 

Would  not  all  this  be  equally  true  if  said  to-day  of  our  producers  of 
cloth  and  iron,  coal  and  lead  ?  Does  the  policy  you  advocate  tend  to 
place  them  in  a  position  successfully  to  contend  with  those  British  man- 
ufacturers who  "  voluntarily  incur  immense  losses,  in  bad  times,  in  order 
to  destroy  foreign  competition,  and  to  gain  and  keep  possession  of  foreign 
markets"?  Can  they  resist  the  action  of  the  owners  of  those  "great 
accumulations  of  capital"  which  have  been  made  at  our  cost,  and  are 
now  being  used  to  "  enable  a  few  of  the  most  wealthy  capitalists  to  over- 


54  FINANCIAL  CRISES: 

whelm  all  foreign  competition  in  times  of  great  depression " —  thereby 
largely  adding  to  their  already  enormous  fortunes, "  before  foreign  capital 
can  again  accumulate  to  such  extent  as  to  be  able  to  establish  a  compe- 
tition in  prices  with  any  chances  of  success  "  ?  Can  it  be  to  the  interest 
of  any  country  to  leave  its  miners  and  manufacturers  exposed  to  a  "  war- 
fare" such  as  is  here  officially  declared  ?  Do  not  they  stand  as  much  in 
need  of  protection,  for  the  sake  of  the  consumers,  as  you  would  do  in 
the  case  supposed  ?  Does  not  your  own  experience  prove  that  the  more 
perfect  the  security  of  the  manufacturer  in  the  domestic  market,  the 
greater  is  the  tendency  to  that  increase  of  domestic  competition  which 
tends  to  increase  the  prices  of  raw  materials,  while  lessening  the  cost 
of  cloth  and  iron  ?  Do  not  men,  everywhere,  become  more  free,  as  that 
competition  grows,  and  as  employments  become  more  diversified  ?  Is 
not,  then,  the  question  we  are  discussing,  one  of  the  freedom  and  hap- 
piness of  your  fellow-men  ?  If  so,  is  it  worthy  of  you  to  offer  to  your 
readers  such  arguments  as  are  contained  in  the  article  above  reprinted  ? 
Holding  myself,  as  always  heretofore,  ready  to  give  to  my  readers 
your  replies  to  the  questions.  I  have  put,  I  remain,  my  dear  sir, 

Yours,  very  truly, 

HENRY  C.  CAREY. 
W.  C.  BRYANT,  ESQ. 

PHILADELPHIA,  March  13/A,  1860. 


THEIR  CAUSES   AND   EFFECTS.  55 


LETTER    TWELFTH. 

DEAR  SIR  :  —  Thirty  years  since,  South  Carolina,  prompted  by  a 
determination  to  resist  the  execution  of  laws  that  were  in  full  accordance 
with  both  the  letter  and  the  spirit  of  the  Constitution,  first  moved  a  dis- 
solution of  the  Union.  Failing  to  find  a  second,  she  stood  alone.  Since 
then,  all  has  greatly  changed.  Now,  each  successive  day  brings  with  it 
from  the  South  not  only  threats  but  measures  of  disunion,  each  in  its 
turn  finding  more  persons  in  the  centre  and  the  North  anxious  for  the 
maintenance  of  the  Union,  yet  disposed  towards  acquiescence  in  the 
decision  of  their  southern  brethren,  whatever  that  may  prove  to  be. 
This  is  a  great  change  to  have  been  effected  in  so  brief  a  period,  and  sad 
as  it  is  great.  To  what  may  it  be  attributed,  and  how  may  the  remedy 
be  applied? 

Before  answering  this  latter  question,  let  us  inquire  into  the  causes 
of  .the  disease  —  for  that  purpose  looking  for  a  moment  into  the  records 
of  our  past.  The  men  who  made  the  Revolution  did  so,  because  they 
were  tired  of  a  system  the  essence  of  which  was  found  in  Lord  Chatham's 
declaration,  that  the  colonists  should  not  be  permitted  to  make  for  them- 
selves "  even  so  much  as  a  single  hobnail."  They  were  sensible  of  the 
exhaustive  character  of  a  policy  that  compelled  them  to  make  all  their 
exchanges  in  a  single  market — thereby  enriching  their  foreign  masters, 
while  ruining  themselves.  Against  this  system  they  needed  protection, 
and  therefore  did  they  make  the  Revolution  —  seeking  political  inde- 
pendence as  a  means  of  obtaining  industrial  and  commercial  independ- 
ence. To  render  that  protection  really  effective,  they  formed  a  more 
perfect  union,  whose  first  Congress  gave  us,  as  its  first  law,  an  act  for 
the  protection  of  manufactures.  Washington  and  his  secretaries,  Ham- 
ilton and  Jefferson,  approved  this  course  of  action,  and  in  so  doing  were 
followed  by  all  of  Washington's  successors,  down  to  General  Jackson. 
For  half  a  century,  from  1783  to  1833,  such  was  the  general  tendency 
of  our  commercial  policy,  and  therefore  was  it  that,  notwithstanding  the 
plunder  of  our  merchants  under  British  Orders  in  Council  and  French 
Decrees,  and  notwithstanding  interferences  with  commerce  by  embargo 
and  non-intercourse  laws,  there  occurred  in  that  long  period,  in  time  of 
peace,  no  single  financial  revulsion,  involving  suspension  by  our  banks, 
or  stoppage  of  payment  by  the  government.  In  all  that  period  there 
was,  consequently,  a  general  tendency  toward  harmony  between  the  North 
and  the  South,  in  reference  to  the  vexed  question  of  slavery — both  Vir- 
ginia and  Maryland  having,  in  1832,  shown  themselves  almost  prepared 
for  abolition.  Had  the  then  existing  commercial  policy  been  maintained, 
the  years  that  since  have  passed  would  have  been  marked  by  daily 
growth  of  harmony,  and  of  confidence  in  the  utility  and  permanence  of 
our  Union. 

Such,  unhappily,  was  not  to  be  the  case.     Even  at  that  moment  South 
Carolina  was  preparing  to  assume  that  entire  control  of  our  commercial 


56  FINANCIAL  CRISES: 

policy,  •which,  with  the  exception  of  a  single  Presidential  term,  she  has 
since  maintained — thereby  forcing  the  Union  back  to  that  colonial  system, 
emancipation  from  which  had  been  the  primary  object  of  the  men  who 
made  the  Revolution.  With  that  exception  her  reign  has  now  endured 
for  more  than  five  and  twenty  years,  a  period  marked  by  constantly- 
recurring  financial  convulsions,  attended  by  suspensions  of  our  banks, 
bankruptcies  of  individuals  and  of  the  government,  and  growing  disc9rd 
among  the  States. 

What,  you  will  probably  ask,  is  the  connection  between  financial  re- 
vulsion and  sectional  discord  ?  Go  with  me,  my  dear  sir,  for  a  moment, 
into  the  poor  dwelling  of  one  of  our  unemployed  workmen,  and  I  will 
show  you.  The  day  is  cold,  and  so  is  his  stove.  His  wife  and  children 
are  poorly  clothed.  His  bed  has  been  pawned  for  money  with  which  to 
obtain  food  for  his  starving  family.  He  himself  has  for  months  been 
idle,  the  shop  in  which  he  had  been  used  to  work  having  been  closed, 
and  its  owner  ruined.  Ask  him  why  is  this,  and  he  will  tell  you  to  look 
to  our  auction-stores  and  our  shops,  gorged  with  the  products  of  foreign 
labor,  while  our  own  laborers  perish  in  the  absence  of  employment  that 
will  give  them  food.  Ask  him  what  is  the  remedy  for  this,  and,  if  he 
is  old  enough  to  remember  the  admirable  effects  of  the  tariff  of  1842, 
he  will  tell  you  that  there  can  be  none,  so  long  as  southern  commercial 
policy  shall  continue  to  carry  poverty,  destitution,  and  death,  into  the 
homes  of  those  who  must  sell  their  labor  if  they  would  live.  That  man 
has,  perhaps,  already  conceived  some  idea  of  the  existence  of  an  "  irre- 
pressible conflict"  between  free  and  slave  labor.  A  year  hence,  he  may 
be  driven  by  poverty  into  abolitionism. 

The  picture  here  presented  is  no  fancy  sketch.  It  is  drawn  from  life. 
This  man  is  the  type  of  hundreds  of  thousands,  I  might  say  millions, 
of  persons  of  various  conditions  of  life,  who  have  been  ruined  in  the 
repeated  financial  crises  of  the  five-and-twenty  years  of  British  free  trade 
and  South  Carolinian  domination.  Follow  those  men  on  their  weary 
way  to  the  West,  embittered  as  they  are  by  the  knowledge  that  it  is  to 
southern  policy  it  is  due  that  they  are  compelled  to  separate  themselves 
from  homes  and  friends,  and  perhaps  from  wives  and  children.  See  them, 
on  their  arrival  there,  paying  treble  and  quadruple  prices  for  the  land 
they  need,  to  the  greedy  speculator  who  finds  his  richest  harvest  in  free 
trade  times.  Mark  them,  next,  contracting  for  the  payment  of  four  and 
even  five  per  cent  per  month,  for  the  little  money  they  need,  knowing, 
as  they  do,  that  we  are  exporting  almost  millions  of  gold  per  week,  to 
pay  to  foreigners  for  services  that  they  would  gladly  have  performed. 
Watch  them  as  they  give  for  little  more  than  a  single  yard  of  cotton 
cloth,  a  bushel  of  corn,  that  under  a  different  policy  would  give  them 
almost  a  dozen  yards.  Trace  them  onward,  until  you  find  their  little 
properties  passing  into  the  hands  of  the  sheriff,  they  themselves  being 
forced  to  seek  new  homes  in  lands  that  are  even  yet  more  distant. 
Reflect,  I  pray  you,  upon  these  facts,  and  you  will  find  in  them,  my  dear 
sir,  the  reasons  why  the  soil  of  Kansas  has  been  stained  by  the  blood  of 
men  who,  under  other  legislation,  would  have  been  found  acting  together 
for  the  promotion  of  the  general  good. 

Mr.  Calhoun  sowed  the  seeds  of  sectionalism,  abolitionism,  and  dis- 
union, on  the  day  on  which  he  planted  his  free  trade  tree.  Well  watered 


THEIE  CAUSES   AND   EFFECTS.  67 

and  carefully  tended  by  yourself  and  others,  all  have  thriven,  and  all  are 
now  yielding  fruit  —  in  exhaustion  of  the  soil  of  the  older  States,  and 
consequent  thirst  for  the  acquisition  of  distant  territory;  in  Kansas 
murders  and  Harper's  Ferry  riots;  in  civil  and  foreign  wars.  It  is 
the  same  fruit  that  has  been  produced  in  Ireland,  India,  and  all  other 
countries  that  are  subjected  to  the  British  system.  Desiring  that  the 
fruit  may  wither,  you  must  lay  the  axe  to  the  root  of  the  tree.  That 
done,  the  noxious  plants  that  have  flourished  in  its  shade  will  quickly 
decay  and  disappear. 

We  are  told,  however,  that  the  interests  of  the  South  are  to  be  pro- 
moted by  the  maintenance  of  the  system  under  which  Ireland  and  India 
have  been  ruined,  and  which  it  is  the  fashion  of  the  day  to  term  free 
trade.  Was  that  the  opinion  of  Washington,  Jefferson,  Madison,  or 
Jackson  ?  Is  it,  even  now,  the  opinion  of  those  Southern  men  whose 
views  in  regard  to  the  slavery  question  are  most  in  accordance  with  your 
own  ?  Are  not  Kentucky  and  Tennessee,  Virginia  and  North  Caro- 
lina, Alabama  and  Missouri,  rich  in  fuel  and  iron  ore,  and  all  the  other 
materials  required  for  the  production  of  a  varied  industry?  Did  not 
the  domestic  consumption  of  cotton  increase  thrice  more  rapidly  than 
the  population,  under  the  tariff  of  1842  ?  Had  it  continued  to  increase 
as  it  then  was  doing,  would  it  not  now  absorb  a  million  and  a  half  of 
bales  —  diminishing  by  many  hundreds  of  thousands  the  quantity  for 
which  we  need  a  foreign  market  ?  Under  such  circumstances  would  not 
our  planters  obtain  more  for  two  and  a  half  million  of  bales  than  they 
now  do  for  three  and  a  half  millions  ?  Rely  upon  it,  my  dear  sir,  there 
is  no  discord  in  the  real  and  permanent  interests  of  the  various  sections 
of  the  Union.  There,  all  is  perfect  harmony,  and  what  we  now  most 
need  is  the  recognition,  by  men  like  you,  and  by  our  southern  brethren, 
of  the  existence  of  that  great  and  important  fact.  In  that  direction,  and 
that  alone,  may  be  found  the  remedy  for  our  great  disease. 

Looking  for  it  there,  the  effect  will  soon  exhibit  itself  in  this  develop- 
ment of  the  vast  natural  resources  of  every  section  of  the  country — in 
the  utilization  of  the  great  water-powers  of  both  South  and  North  —  and 
in  the  increase  of  that  internal  commerce  to  which,  alone,  we  can  look 
for  extrication  from  the  difficulties  in  which  we  are  now  involved.  Let 
our  policy  be  such  as  to  produce  development  of  that  commerce,  and 
villages  will  become  tied  to  villages,  cities  to  cities,  States  to  States,  and 
zones  to  zones,  by  silken  threads  scarcely  visible  to  the  eye,  yet  strong 
enough  to  bid  defiance  to  every  effort  that  may  be  made  to  break  them. 
British  policy  sought  to  prevent  the  creation  of  such  threads  —  British 
politicians  having  seen  that  by  crossing  and  recrossing  each  other,  and 
tying  together  the  Puritan  of  the  north,  the  Quaker,  the  German,  and 
the  Irishman  of  the  centre,  and  the  Episcopalian  of  the  south,  they 
would  give  unity  and  strength  to  the  great  whole  that  would  be  thus 
produced.  Such,  too,  is  the  tendency  of  our  present  policy,  our  whole 
energies  having  been,  and  being  now,  given  to  the  creation  of  nearly 
parallel  lines  of  communication  —  roads  and  canals  passing  from  west  to 
east  through  New  York  and  Pennsylvania,  Maryland,  Virginia,  and  Caro- 
lina—  always  at  war  with  each  other,  arid  never  touching  untij  they 
reach  the  commercial  capital  of  the  British  islands.  In  that  direction 
lie  pauperism,  sectionalism,  weakness,  and  final  ruin  of  our  system. 


58  FINANCIAL   CRISES  : 

Desiring  that  the  Union  may  be  maintained  we  must  seek  again  the  road 
so  plainly  indicated  to  us  by  Washington,  Jefferson,  Madison,  Monroe, 
and  Jackson,  the  greatest  men  the  South  has  yet  produced. 

In  common  with  Franklin  and  Adams,  Hancock  and  Hamilton,  those 
men  clearly  saw  that  it  was  to  the  industrial  element  we  were  to  look 
for  that  cement  by  which  our  people  and  our  States  were  to  be  held 
together. .  Forgetting  all  the  lessons  they  had  taught,  we  have  now  so 
long  been  following  in  the  direction  indicated  by  our  British  free  trade 
friend*  —  by  those  who  now  see,  as  was  seen  before  the  Revolution,  in 
the  dispersion  of  our  people  the  means  of  maintaining  colonial  vassalage 
— that  already  are  they  congratulating  themselves  upon  the  approaching 
dissolution  of  the  Union,  and  the  entire  re-establishment  of  British  influ- 
ence over  this  northern  portion  of  the  continent.  For  proof  of  this, 
permit  me  to  refer  you  to  the  following  extracts  from  the  Morning  Post, 
now  the  recognised  organ  of  the  Palmerstonian  government : 

"If  the  Northern  States  should  separate  from  the  Southern  on  the  question  of  slavery 
—  one  which  now  so  fiercely  agitates  the  public  mind  in  America  —  that  portion 
of  the  Grand  Trunk  Railway  which  traverses  Maine,  might  at  any  day  be  closed 
against  England,  unless,  indeed,  the  people  of  that  State,  with  an  eye  to  commercial 
profit,  should  offer  to  annex  themselves  to  Canada.  On  military,  as  well  as  commer- 
cial grounds,  it  is  obviously  necessary  that  British  North  America  should  possess 
on  the  Atlantic  a  p^t  open  at  all  times  of  the  year — a  port  which,  whilst  the  ter- 
minus of  that  railway  communication  which  is  destined  to  do  so  much  for  the 
development  and  consolidation  of  the  wealth  and  prosperity  of  British  North 
America,  will  make  England  equally  in  peace  and  war  independent  of  the  United 
States.  We  trust  that  the  question  of  confederation  will  be  speedily  forced  upon 
the  attention  of  her  Majesty's  Ministers.  The  present  time  is  the  most  propitious 

for  its  discussion If  slavery  is  to  be  the  Nemesis  of  Republican 

America — if  separation  is  to  take  place — the  confederated  States  of  British  North 
America,  then  a  strong  and  compact  nation,  would  virtually  hold  the  balance  of 
power  on  the  continent,  and  lead  to  the  restoration  of  that  influence  which,  more  than 
eighty  years  ago,  England  was  supposed  to  have  lost.  This  object,  with  the  uncer- 
tain future  of  Republican  institutions  in  the  United  States  before  us,  is  a  subject 
worthy  of  the  early  and  earnest  consideration  of  the  Parliament  and  people  of  the 
mother  country." 

Shall  these  anticipations  be  realised  ?  That  they  must  be  so,  unless 
our  commercial  policy  shall  be  changed,  is  as  certain  as  that  the  light 
of  day  will  follow  the  darkness  of  the  night.  Look  where  we  may,  dis- 
cord, decay,  and  slavery,  march  hand  in  hand  with  the  British  free  trade 
system  —  harmony  and  freedom,  wealth  and  strength,  on  the  contrary, , 
growing  in  all  those  countries  by  which  that  system  is  resisted.  Such 
having  been,  and  being  now,  the  case,  are  you  not,  my  dear  sir,  in  your 
steady  advocacy  of  Carolinian  policy  among  ourselves,  doing  all  that  lies 
in  your  power  toward  undoing  the  work  that  was  done  by  the  men  of  '76  ? 

Repeating  once  again  my  offer  to  place  your  answers  to  this  and  other 
questions  within  the  reach  of  a  million  and  a  half  of  protectionist  readers, 
I  remain,  Yours,  very  respectfully, 

HENRY  C.  CAREY. 
W.  C.  BRYANT,  ESQ. 

PHILADELPHIA,  March  21,  1860. 


OUR  FUTURE. 


DEAR  SIR: — 

What  was  said  so  very  briefly  a  fortnight  since,  I  propose  now  to  say 
somewhat  more  at  large,  hoping  that  you  may  find  leisure  for  its  considera- 
tion. 

Our  late  Finance  Minister  had  been  intended  by  Dame  Nature  for  clerk 
of  a  country  bank.  Out  of  such  material  Mr.  Lincoln  thought  to  make  a 
statesman  ;  a  blunder  that  he  could  not  have  committed  had  he  studied  the 
poor  man's  reports  in  his  capacity  of  Comptroller.  It  has  proved  a  sad  one 
for  the  country,  although  the  crop  of  trouble  he  has  raised  has  even  yet 
hardly  commenced  to  be  reaped. 

That  the  question  of  repudiation  might  be  for  ever  dismissed  from  sight 
and  thought  it  was  essential  that  the  debt  should  from  year  to  year  be  made 
less  burthensome.  Directly  the  reverse  of  this,  he  has  made  it  hourly  more 
and  more  oppressive. 

In  May,  1865,  he  assured  me  that  be  had  been  always  a  thorough  dis- 
ciple of  Mr.  Clay,  and  that,  as  affording  the  most  efficient  and  reliable  pro- 
tection, he  "  would  be  glad  to  see  gold  maintained,  for  years  to  come,  at 
175."  Soon  after,  having  then  allied  himself  with  the  money-lending  class, 
he  determined  that  within  three  years  legal  tenders  should  be  brought  to 
par.  But  little  later  we  find  him  to  have  become  a  very  doubting  protec- 
tionist, as  the  step  preliminary  to  an  adoption  of  British  free-trade  doctrines. 

For  years  he  has  tried  to  put  down  the  price  of  gold ;  to  deprive  the 
people  of  much  needed  machinery  of  circulation  ;  to  make  money  scarce  and 
to  raise  the  rates  of  interest ;  to  depress  the  wages  of  labor ;  and  to  elevate 
the  receiver  of  fixed  incomes  at  the  cost  of  farmers,  miners  and  mechanics. 
He  could  not,  or  would  not,  see  that  reduction  of  gold  meant  merely  the 
opening  of  our  ports  more  widely  to  the  entry  of  goods  that  should  be  made 
at  home  ;*  that  by  raising  the  rate  of  interest  he  was  throwing"  obstacles  in 
the  way  of  production  ;  that  by  threatening  reduction  of  prices  he  was  pro- 
ducing paralysis  of  the  societary  body  ;  that  he  was  thus  making  it  more 
necessary  to  seek  supplies  abroad ;  and,  that  his  every  movement  tended 
towards  increasing  an  absenteeism  that  now  demands  annually  $50,000,000, 
and  is  likely  soon  to  claim  $100,000,000.  He  would  not  see  that  with  every 
step  in  these  directions  the  country  was  becoming  less  and  less  capable  of 
self  protection. 

*  British  and  other  foreign  agents  deprecate  increase  in  the  price  of  gold,  knowing 
that  it  tends  to  lessen  importations.  Their  agents,  charged  with  the  editorship  of 
prominently  Republican  journals,  assure  our  people,  on  the  contrary,  that  the  higher 
the  premium  the  greater  the  advantage  to  the  foreign  manufacturers  by  whom  they 
themselves  are  being  paid.  There  is  no  sort  of  deception  or  falsehood  that  is  uot 
resorted  to  in  the  free-trade  and  anti-republican  interest. 


Throughout  the  war  the  Treasury  was  in  close  alliance  with  those  who 
had  iHbor  to  sell,  and  needed  to  buy,  or  borrow,  money ;  and  therefore  did 
we  prow  in  wealth  and  strength.  Since  the  peace  it  lias  been  steadily  op- 
posed to  that  great  class,  and  therefore  is  it  that  the  party  and  the  nation 
have  been  becoming  from  day  to  day  more  enfeebled. 

In  that  direction,  nevertheless,  did  the  Secretary  look  for  obtaining  power 
to  resume  the  use  of  the  precious  metals,  wholly  unaware,  as  it  would  seem, 
that  resumption  must  come,  if  ever,  as  a  consequence  of  increased  and  not 
'of  diminished  strength.  Therefore  is  it  that  we  have  receded  when 
we  should  have  advanced,  and  are  now  a  score  of  years  further  from  the 
use  of  coin  than  had  been  the  case  at  the  date  of  the  conversation  above  re- 
ferred to.  The  day  may,  perhaps,  arrive  when  it  will  be  clearly  understood 
that  resumption  cannot  be  reached  by  means  of  any  system  whose  tendency 
is  that  of  raising  the  rate  of  interest. 

What  is  to  be  the  policy  of  the  future  no  one  can  now  pretend  to  fore- 
tell. It  is  certain  that  much  which  hitherto  has  been  done  privately  and 
dishonestly  will  in  the  future  be  done  openly  and  honestly,  but,  so  far  as  can 
now  be  seen,  there  is  no  certainty  that  while  saving  drops  at  the  spigot 
we  shall  not  continue  to  lose  gallons  at  the  bung-hole.  Will  the  Treasury 
policy  continue  to  favor  money  lenders  at  the  expense  of  money  borrowers  ? 
Will  it  continue  to  keep  before  the  public  eye  the  idea  that  dollars  now  in- 
vested in  mills  and  mines  are  certain  to  be  worth  but  half  dollars  in  the 
future?  Will  it  continue  in  its  determination  to  secure  to  the  people  of  the 
extreme  North  a  monopoly  of  power  to  furnish  circulation  ?  Will  it  con- 
tinue in  its  determination  to  prevent  the  Centre,  the  South,  and  the  West, 
from  exercising,  in  regard  to  institutions  of  credit,  the  powers  now  so  fully 
exercised  in  the  North  and  East  ?  Will  it  continue  to  close  its  eyes  to  the 
fact  that  the  circulating  note  is  but  the  small  change  of  commerce,  and  that 
a  dollar  note  is  as  harmless  as  a  silver  dime  ?  Will  it  continue  blind 
to  the  fact  that  it  is  the  great  money  of  commerce — that  which  is  used  in 
Wall  street — and  not  its  small  change,  used  by  the  people,  that  needs  regu- 
lation ?  Will  it  continue  to  compel  more  than  half  the  country,  in  default 
of  that  small  change,  to  perform  all  exchanges  by  means  of  barter  ? 
Will  it  continue  to  compel  the  people  of  two-thirds  of  the  entire  surface  of 
the  Union  to  use  counterfeit  notes  because  of  being  deprived  of  power  to  do 
for  themselves  what  is  so  freely  done  by  those  of  New  York  and  New 
England  ?  Will  it  allow  our  whole  people  to  remain  for  months  to  come  in 
utter  ignorance  as  to  its  policy  in  these  important  respects  ? 

Last  year  it  was  supposed  that  Republican  success  would  be  followed  by 
revival  of  confidence.  Directly  the  reverse,  faith  in  our  industrial  and  com- 
mercial future  has  diminished,  and  now  declines  with  each  successive  day. 
Why  ?  Because  there  have  as  yet  been  no  indications  of  any  diminution  in 
the  power  of  the  money-lending  class  to  control  the  societary  movement. 
Because,  in  reference  to  the  question  of  industrial  independence  the  Admin- 
istration has  thus  far  indicated  no  policy  whatsoever.  Because,  its  appoint- 
ments indicate  a  preference  of  the  British  free-trade  and  anti-American 
one ;  or,  at  the  least,  an  indifference  to  this  all-important  question.  The 
most  powerful,  most  dangerous,  and  most  unpopular  of  free-traders  had  the 
offer  of  the  Treasury.  Most  narrowly,  as  we  are  assured,  did  the  nation 
escape  the  injury  that  must  have  resulted  from  being  represented  at  Vienna  by 
the  President  of  the  British  Free-trade  League.  Almost  without  exception 
our  chief  representatives  in  Europe  are  free-traders.  The  single  exception 
that  I  know  of  is  that  of  the  man  who  now  goes  to  the  usual  place  of  political 
exile,  St.  Petersburg.  Our  consuls  and  consuls  general  belong  mainly,  as 


I  believe,  to  that  school  which  teaches  that  "  the  smuggler  is  the  great  re- 
former of  the  age." 

The  last  of  all  qualities  now  demanded  in  men  who  are  to  represent  the 
country  abroad  is  that  of  being  in  policy  truly  and  distinctively  American — 
disciples  in  that  school  in  which  Hamilton  and  Clay  were  teachers,  and  in 
which  it  has  been  always  taught  that  political  independence  cannot  be  arrived 
at  by  means  of  measures  calculated  to  perpetuate  industrial  dependence. 

As  a  consequence  of  all  this  it  is  that  confidence  declines;  that  the 
small  change  of  commerce,  the  circulating  note,  becomes  daily  more  and 
more  scarce  ;  that  the  price  of  money  rises ;  that  the  rich  grow  richer  while 
the  poor  are  unemployed;  that  the  average  rate  of  interest  is  now  twice 
greater  than  it  had  been  throughout  the  war;  and,  that  we  now  march  on 
the  road  of  political  decline,  destined  to  find  at  its  termination  political  and 
material  death. 

To  nil  present  appearance,  this  State  and  Indiana  will,  in  October  next, 
place  themselves  side  by  side  with  the  copperhead  New  Jersey  and  New 
York.  With  another  year  of  hesitating  and  undecided  policy  Ohio  will  be 
led  to  follow  suit,  thereby  giving  to  the  free-trade  Democracy  all  the 
States  from  Illinois  to  the  ocean,  and  from  the  Lakes  to  the  Potomac  and 
Ohio,  every  one  of  which  so  recently  belonged  to  that  great  Republican 
phalanx  which  had  attained  to  power  as  a  consequence  of  its  adoption,  in  1860, 
as  part  of  its  platform,  of  the  grand  idea  that  the  American  laborer  must  be 
protected  against  the  pauper  laborers  of  JZurope.  Without  that  plank,  now 
forgotten,  the  votes  of  this  and  other  States  would  have  been  given  to  the 
Democrats,  and  Mr.  Lincoln  would  have  been  defeated. 

The  whole  centre  of  the  Union  having  been  thus  surrendered  to  the  enemy, 
what  will  be  the  verdict  pronounced  in  1872  ?  Will  it  be  for  or  against  the 
Administration  ?  Can  it  prove  other  than  an  adverse  one  ?  Ought  it  to  be 
other,  if  the  disastrous  policy  of  our  late  Finance  Minister  shall  continue  to 
be  maintained  ? 

The  money  borrowers  give  an  hundred  votes  where  the  money  lenders 
give  a  single  one.  They,  therefore,  it  is  who  make  the  verdict.  Let  it  be 
such  as  it  seems  now  almost  certain  that  it  must  be,  and  what  will  become 
of  the  national  obligations  ?  Will  rebels  and  copperheads,  then  in  power, 
be  disposed  to  pay  them  ?  Will  the  South  and  West  be  disposed  to  tax  them- 
selves for  discharge  of  bonds  held  wholly  in  the  North  and  East  ?  If  they  shall 
be  so  it  will  deserve  to  rank  among  the  most  extraordinary  occurrences  the 
world  has  ever  known.  That  they  will  not  be  so  you  may  regard  as  entirely 
certain. 

Sectionalism  has  been,  as  now  it  is,  our  essential  trouble.  For  half  a  cen- 
tury the  South  governed  us,  and  the  end  of  that  government  was  found  in 
a  rebellion.  Avoiding  Scylla  we  have  fallen  on  Charybdis,  the  money  mo- 
nopoly of  the  extreme  North  working  almost  as  much  mischief  as  before  had 
done  the  slavery  of  the  South.  Now,  as  always  in  the  past,  the  Centre  is 
nowhere  ;  and  yet,  it  is  that  Centre  which  makes  our  presidents.  This  State 
stood  throughout  the  war  the  bulwark  of  the  Union  ;  yet  is  it  now  as  fiercely 
denounced  by  New  England  men  as  before  it  had  been  by  the  whole  body  of 
Southern  rebels.  Let  it  now  be  driven,  as  it  seems  likely  soon  to  be,  from 
the  republican  party,  and  the  party  itself  will  prove  to  have  been  but  a 
mighty  failure. 

The  democratic  British  free  trade  paralysis  of  1840  elected  the  whig  Har- 
risou.  That  of  1348  elected  Taylor,  as  that  of  1859-60  did  by  Lincoln. 
Will  it  be  then  extraordinary  if  a  republican  paralysis  of  1872  shall  elect  a 


copperhead,  thereby  showing  that  republicanism  had  proved  itself  a  failure  ? 
As  it  seems  to  me,  it  certainly  will  not. 

You  say,  however,  that  Congress  makes  the  laws,  and  that  the  Executive 
has  no  choice  but  to  carry  them  into  effect.  Here,  as  it  seems  to  me,  you 
are  in  error,  all  our  financial  operations  for  the  past  four  years  having  been 
dictated  by  the  Secretary  and  a  little  Senatorial  clique,  backed  by  men  who 
sought  to  raise  the  price  of  money,  and  to  augment  their  fortunes  at  the 
cost  of  both  the  people  and  the  State.  Let  the  Treasury  now  terminate  its 
alliance  with  the  money-lending  aristocracy  ;  let  it  look  a  little  kindly  on  the 
money-borrowing  democracy  ;  let  it  seek  to  unite  itself  with  the  real  Congress, 
and  it  can  then  have  any  intelligent  legislation  for  which  it  may  see  fit  to  ask. 
Let  it  fail  to  do  these  things,  and  the  downfall  of  the  party  will  come  as  cer- 
tainly as  darkness  follows  the  setting  of  the  sun.  It  came  into  power  as  advo- 
cate of  the  rights  of  the  laboring  many,  black  and  white,  northern  and  south- 
ern. It  loses  power  as  it  becomes  more  and  more  the  ally  of  the  few  by 
whom  the  many  are  governed,  these  latter  feeling  that  the  whip  of  the  money 
lender  and  the  lash  of  the  slave-driver  are  close  kindred  with  each  other. 

In  1,857  I  addressed  to  Mr.  Buchanan  a  private  letter  in  which  his  atten- 
tion was  called  to  the  fact,  that  the  circumstances  under  which  he  and  Mr. 
Van  Buren  had  come  into  power,  as  well  as  those  which  almost  at  once  had 
followed,  had  been  precisely  alike.  Such  having  been  the  case,  I  told  him 
that  if  he  would  study  the  policy  of  his  free-trade  and  anti-bank  predeces- 
sor, and  then  carefully  follow  it  out,  the  result  to  both  would  prove  to  have 
been  the  same,  to  wit,  political  ruin.  If,  on  the  contrary,  he  would  adopt  a 
course  directly  the  reverse,  he  would,  as  I  believed,  build  up  the  greatest  party 
the  country  had  ever  known,  and  be  himself  its  head.  He  preferred  the  for- 
mer, and  the  end  was  ruin  to  both  his  party  and  himself. 

While  all  the  world  was  lauding  Louis  Philippe  as  the  "  Napoleon  of 
Peace,"!  was  accustomed  to  tell  my  friends  that  he  was  a  mere  trickster,  and 
would  never  establish  his  dynasty.  In  December,  1847,  when  he  was  at  the 
zenith  of  his  reputation,  I  published  a  little  sketch  of  France,  in  which  it 
was  shown  why  it  was  that  such  must  inevitably  be  the  result  of  the  course 
then  being  pursued.  Two  months  later,  that  prophecy  had  become  history. 
So  was  it. later  with  Mr.  Buchanan,  the  letter  then  written  him  having  proved 
to  be  almost  a  history,  written  in  advance,  of  the  seven  unhappy  years  that 
followed. 

From  the  sublime  to  the  ridiculous,  as  we  are  told,  is  but  a  single  step. 
So  did  it  prove  to  be  with  Napoleon.  So  was  it  with  Louis  Philippe.  So 
is  Louis  Napoleon — as  a  consequence  of  his  blind  imitation  of  British  po- 
licy— now  beginning  to  find  it.  So  did  we  ourselves  find  it  as  we  passed  from 
that  American  system  by  aid  of  which,  in  1834-5,  we  finally  extinguished  the 
public  debt,  to  that  British  one,  by  means  of  which  we  were  led,  in  1842,  to 
being  compelled  to  send  Macalester  and  Robinson  to  Europe  to  beg,  and 
beg  in  vain,  for  the  loan  of  a  dozen  millions.  So,  too,  was  it  found  as  we 
passed  from  that  American  period  which  gave  us  power  to  raise  the  Stars  and 
Stripes  over  the  "  Halls  of  the  Montezumas,"  to  that  British  free  trade  one 
which  led  to  striking  our  flag  at  Sumpter,  and  to  holding  our  existence  at 
the  pleasure  of  Russell  and  Napoleon.  Once  again,  we  have  reached  the 
sublime.  Once  again,  we  are  fast  approaching  the  ridiculous.  How  long 
before  it  will  be  reached  ?  One  more  false  step  now  made,  and  the  work  will 
be  accomplished. 

We  are  now,  as  journalists  advise  us,  to  have  a  vigorous  foreign  policy. 
To  what,  however,  are  we  to  look  for  power  to  carry  such  an  one  into  full 


5 

effect?  Could  we  have  had  it  at  the  close  of  the  free-trade  period  of  1817, 
when  the  domestic  commerce  was  so  utterly  ruined  ?  Could  we  have  had  it 
in  that  British  free-trade  period  which  closed  our  mills  and  furnaces,  destroyed 
our  commerce,  and  compelled  us  to  beg  abroad  for  loans  ?  Did  we  not  have 
it  in  the  closing  years  of  that  protective  period  which  commenced  in  1843  ? 
Might  we  not  have  it  now,  protection  having  built  furnaces  and  mills  and  thus 
enabled  us  to  carry  to  a  successful  close  the  greatest  civil  war  the  world  had 
ever  known  ?  Shall  we  have  it  five  years  hence,  after  a  repetition  of  blun- 
ders like  those  of  1843,  1846,  and  1857  ?  That  we  shall  not  is  very  certain. 

A  vigorous  foreign  policy  means  the  acquisition  of  Cuba,  San  Domingo, 
Canada,  and  power  to  enforce  the  doctrines  of  Senator  Snmner's  speech. 
To  that  speech  Britain  makes  answer  by  buying  up  our  journals,  and  by.scatter- 
ing  well  paid  lecturers  throughout  the  country,  many  of  them  professing  to 
be  republicans,  but  all  mainly  engaged  in  making  democratic  free-trade  votes. 
British  gold  is  thus  undermining  an  Administration  whose  members  wait,  as 
it  seems  to  me,  with  folded  arms,  the  arrival  of  the  time  when  they  shall  find 
themselves  compelled  to  cry — Too  late  !  Too  late  ! 

In  ante-revolutionary  times  our  men,  feeling  themselves  oppressed  by 
Britain  and  knowing  that  the  way  to  reach  her  conscience  was  through  her 
pocket,  destroyed  shiploads  of  tea.  men  and  women  soon  after  uniting  in  a 
determination  to  consume  no  articles  of  British  manufacture.  Their  suc- 
cessors, again  oppressed  by  means  of  Orders  in  Council,  profited  of  the  ex- 
ample that  had  thus  been  set  them  by  prohibiting  the  import  of  British 
manufactures;  and  this  they  did  although  the  goods  thus  prohibited  would 
have  come  in  American  ships,  Wiser  grown,  we  now  make  on  one  band 
large  demands,  while  on  the  other  tilling  the  British  markets  with  bonds 
given  in  payment  for  cloth  and  iron  that  might,  and  should,  be  made  at 
home  ;  those  goods,  too,  coming  in  British  ships  whose  owners  are  thus 
enabled  to  profit  by  the  spoliations  of  the  past.*  Seeking  reparation  in  that 
direction  all  our  efforts  must  prove  abortive.  To  enable  us  really  to  obtain 
it  we  should  say  to  the  British  people,  as  was  said  by  the  men  of  the  revolu- 
tion, that  If  they  ivish  to  supply  us  with  cloth  and  iron  they  must  come  here 
and  make  them.  The  assertion  of  that  determination  would  do  more  in  a 
single  year  towards  obtaining  full  and  complete  satisfaction  than  will  be  done 
in  a  century  of  the  system  that  now  exists. 

Moving  in  one  direction  we  shall  dictate  law,  thus  securing  to  ourselves  a 
permanent  place  as  THE  GREAT  POWER  OF  THE  EARTH.  Travelling  in  the 
other  we  shall  find  ourselves  compelled  to  accept  as  law  the  decision  of 
Britain,  and  shall  forfeit  the  place  we  now  seem  to  have  secured. 

The  foundation  of  a  vigorous  foreign  policy  must  here  be  laid,  as  in  Bri- 
tain, France,  and  now  again  in  Germany,  it  has  been  laid,  in  a  vigorous 
domestic  one.  The  administration  must  have  an  American  policy— one  that 
shall  be  directly  the  reverse  of  that  which  is  now  being  dictated  to  us  by 
journals  and  journalists  in  the  pay  of  Liverpool  and  Manchester.  It  must 
awake  to  the  fact  that  all  our  power  of  the  last  few  years  has  resulted  from 
an  activity  of  the  societary  circulation  without  parallel  in  the  annals  of  the 
world.  It  must  begin  to  appreciate  the  fact  that  the  whole  force  of  the 
treasury  for  the  last  four  years  has  been  directed  to  destruction  of  that  circu- 
lation ;  to  the  production  of  paralysis ;  and,  to  the  alienation  of  that  great 
class  by  which  the  war  had  so  successfully  been  made.f  Failing  to  do  this,  it 

*  The  import  of  rail  road  bars  in  March  last  was  at  the  rate  of  500,000  tons  per 
annum,  yielding  to  British  iron  masters  $20,000,000  in  gold. 

f  The  editor  of  the  Tribune,  believing,  apparently,  that  palsy  and  strength  go  hand 
in  hand  together,  just  now  tells  his  readers  that  he  hopes  "  to  hear  the  present  sum- 
mer characterized  as  the  dullest  ever  known."  Could  he  but  be  persuaded  to  study 


6 

ranst  prepare  to  meet  at  the  next  election  a  verdict  as  unfavorable  as  that 
which  had  before  been  rendered  in  regard  to  Mr.  Buchanan  and  Louis  Phil- 
lippe. 

Very  sad  is  it  to  see  that  such  is  likely  to  be  the  cnse.  More  sad  is  it 
to  know  that,  so  far  as  now  can  be  seen,  nothing  is  likely  to  be  done  towards 
preventing  an  occurrence  so  disastrous  for  ourselves  and  for  the  world  at 
large. 

The  President  might,  if  he  would,  prevent  all  this.  He  might,  if  he  would, 
have  the  whole  nation  at  his  back.  To  that  end,  however,  it  would  be  required 
to  know  if  his  Administration  meant  to  look  for  support  to  its  working  men ; 
or,  on  the  other  hand,  to  the  bankers  of  Wall  and  State  Streets,  the  capitalists 
of  Boston  and  Lowell,  Liverpool  and  Manchester,  all  of  whom  are  now  so 
well  represented  by  Messrs.  Wells  &  Atkinson,  the  Springfield  Walker,  and 
other  members  of  a  Lengue  that  derives  its  chief  support  from  contributions 
of  British  and  other  foreign  gold. 

Had  the  President  witnessed,  in  1860,  the  enthusiasm  exhibited  by  the 
whole  20,000  men  assembled  in  the  convention  that  nominated  Mr.  Lincoln 
— had  he,  I  say,  witnessed  the  wonderful  enthusiasm  with  which  the  re- 
inauguration  of  protection  then  was  hailed,  he  would  have  no  difficulty  in 
knowing  how  to  reach  the  American  heart.  Had  he  witnessed  it,  he  would 
now  have  but  little  difficulty  in  understanding  that  the  hesitating  and  uncer- 
tain policy  of  the  present  could  have  no  end  other  than  that  of  political 
ruin. 

War  now  exists  between  British  capitalists  and  American  workingmen, 
farmers,  miners,  and  mechanics.  It  is  a  war  that  can  have  no  end  other  than 
that  of  final  and  utter  ruin  to  the  one  or  the  other.  On  which  side  does  the 
Administration  propose  to  fight  ?  For  one,  I  do  not  pretend  even  to 
guess  at  the  answer  that  may  here  be  given,  nor  do  I  know  of  any  one  who 
does.  Every  hour  that  such  answer  is  delayed  gives  strength  to  that  demo- 
cratic British  free-trade  party  whose  advent  to  power  seems  now  so  near  at 
hand. 

Desiring  to  conciliate  workingmen,  Congress  enacted  an  eight-hour  law,  the 
true  intent  and  meaning  of  which  has  been  till  now  disputed.  Moving  in  the 
same  direction,  the  President  to-day  decides  that  those  of  them  in  the  public 
service  shall  receive  ten  hours  of  pay  for  eight  hours  of  work  ;  and  yet,  at  the 
close  of  nearly  three  months  of  his  Administration,  it  is  quite  uncertain  whe- 
ther its  policy  does,  or  does  not,  look  to  compelling  such  men,  farmers, 
miners,  and  mechanics,  to  compete,  wholly  unprotected,  with  Germans,  Bel- 
gians, Frenchmen,  and  others,  all  of  whom  gladly  work  a  dozen  hours  per 
day,  greatly  thankful  for  wages  insufficient  for  enabling  them  to  give  to 
wives  and  children  proper  supplies  of  the  commonest  necessaries  of  life. 
Hesitating  thus  between  the  money  borrowers  on  one  hand,  and  money  lend- 
ers on  the  other,  republican  leaders  seem  destined  to  lose  the  confidence  of 
all,  the  great  party  itself  thereafter  passing  from  existence,  leaving  behind 
little  but  a  remembrance  of  the  great  powers  it  had  once  possessed,  and  of 
the  total  failure  of  those  in  its  direction  properly  to  exercise  them.  For 
preventing  this  there  is  but  a  single  course  of  action,  and  that  is  to  be  found 
in  the  frank  and  determined  adoption  of  a  broad,  liberal,  and  really  Ameri- 
can policy — one  that  shall  look  to  the  thorough  development  of  all  our  won- 

the  financial  history  of  the  past  four  years  he  would  be  led  to  see  that  the  policy  he 
had  so  consistently  advocated  had  been  carrying  us  from,  and  not  towards,  resump- 
tion ;  and,  that  it  had  had  the  effect  of  making  it  now  almost  certain  that  the  control 
of  the  Union  would  soon  pass  into  the  hands  of  men  who  disclaimed  all  liability  for 
the  public  debt,  and  whose  pecuniary  interests  were  to  be  benefited  by  repudiation. 


7 

derful  national  resources ;  to  the  emancipation  of  onr  farmers  and  planters 
from  the  burthen  of  a  tax  of  transportation  compared  with  which  that  im- 
posed by  the  national  debt  is  utterly  unimportant ;  and,  more  than  all,  to 
the  recognition  of  a  full  equality  of  rights  in  reference  to  institutions  of 
credit,  among  the  whole  people  of  the  Union,  North  and  South,  East  and 
West. 

"  Cut  boldly  !"  said  the  sibyl  to  the  hesitating  Roman  king.  Let  the 
Administration  now  take  the  same  advice — let  it  "cut  boldly,"  and  on 
the  American  side,  and  all  may  yet  be  saved.  Will  this  be  done  ?  I  fear 
not  1  The  Scotch  have  a  proverb  which  says,  that  "  He  who  wills  to  Cupar 
maun  to  Cupar," — that  is,  he  who  is  bent  on  self-destruction  will  find  a  way 
for  accomplishment  of  his  object.  The  Republican  party  has  so  long  labored 
in  that  direction  that  it  can  hardly  now  be  induced  to  enter  on  any  other. 

To  face  the  difficulties  created  by  recent  finance  ministers,  and  so 
to  do  it  as  to  be  enabled  to  overcome  them,  requires  almost  as  much 
courage  as  had  been  needed  for  carrying  on  the  war.  With  every  manifes- 
tation of  such  courage,  however,  the  work  will  become  more  easy,  as  confi- 
dence will  thereby  be  revived  among  the  great  body  of  the  people — those 
who  have  labor  to  sell  and  money  to  buy — those  upon  whom  the  hand 
of  the  late  Secretary  has  so  heavily  been  laid.  With  every  step  in  that 
direction,  there  will  arise  new  reason  for  hoping  that  rebels  and  copperheads 
may  be  prevented  from  obtaining  direction  of  the  State.  Weakness  and 
hesitation,  on  the  contrary,  in  reference  to  the  great  economical  questions  now 
before  us,  can  have  no  effect  other  than  that  of  encouraging  them,  while 
correspondingly  depressing  those  to  whom  the  Government  owes  its  present 
existence. 

In  October,  1857,  being  in  London,  I  had  a  conversation  with  Mr.  Dallas, 
in  the  course  of  which  he  asked  when  the  Capitol  was  likely  to  be  com- 
pleted. In  answer,  he  was  told  that  "  it  would  be  about  the  time  when  the 
Union  would  be  dissolved."  "Why, "said  he,  "is  it  going  to  be  dissolved?" 
"  Yes,"  replied  I,  "nothing  can  stand  against  the  solvent  powers  of  the 
tariff  of  1846.  It  would  destroy  any  country  in  the  world."  Most  unwill- 
ing was  he,  of  course,  to  believe  this.  And  yet,  since  then  the  Union  has 
been  dissolved,  the  Capitol  even  yet  remaining  uncompleted. 

In  conclusion  of  an  epistle  that  has  greatly  exceeded  in  its  length  the  idea 
with  which  it  had  been  commenced,  allow  me  now  to  say  that  I  do  not  at  all 
insist  on  your  believing  any  part  of  it.  All  I  ask  is,  that  it  be  read  atten- 
tively, and  then  put  carefully  away  to  be  re-read  in  November,  1872.  You 
will  then  have  seen  whether  or  not  my  present  predictions  had  been  as 
thoroughly  verified  as  before  had  been  those  in  reference  to  the  predecessors 
of  President  Lincoln  and  Louis  Napoleon. 

Accept  the  assurance  of  the  regard  with  which  I  remain 

Yours  very  truly, 

HON.  A.  E.  BORIE.  HENRY  C.  CAREY. 

Philadelphia,  May  22d,  1869. 


THE  WAT  TO  OUTDO  ENGLAND  WITHOUT  FIGHTING  HER. 


LETTERS 


HON.  SCHUYLER   COLFAX, 

Speaker  of  the  House  of  Representatives. 


BY 

EENEY   C.   CAREY, 

AUTHOR  OF  "PRINCIPLES  OF   SOCIAL   SCIENCE,"  ETC.  ETC. 


PHILADELPHIA: 

HENEY    CAEEY    BATED, 

INDUSTRIAL    PUBLISHER, 
406  Walnut  Street. 

1865. 


THE   IRON    QUESTION. 


LETTEE  S 


HON.   SCHUYLER    COLFAX, 

Speaker  of  the  House  of  Representatives, 


BY 

H.    C.    CAEEY. 


PHILADELPHIA: 

COLLINS,   PRINTER,   705  JAYNE   STREET. 
1865. 


THE  IRON  QUESTION. 


LETTER   FIFTH. 

DEAR  SIR: — 

OF  all  the  metals  there  is  none  that,  in  its  character  of  an  instru- 
ment to  be  used  for  facilitating  exchanges,  does  so  much  as  is 
done  by  gold  in  promoting  that  combination  of  effort  which  is  the 
essential  characteristic  of  civilization.  It  is  in  that  capacity  only, 
however,  that  it  performs  such  service.  Coming  to  the  hands  of 
men  ready  for  use,  it  makes  little  demand  for  combination  in  its 
preparation,  the  golden  particles  found  in  the  miner's  pan  being 
almost  as  fully  fitted  for  man's  service  as  are  the  large  pieces  sent 
abroad  from  the  mints  of  this  city  or  of  London. 

Widely  different  is  it  with  regard  to  that  greatest  of  all  metals 
by  help  of  which  we  cultivate  our  fields,  mine  our  coal,  build  our 
houses,  and  plate  our  ships.  Coming  to  us  in  combination  with  an 
almost  infinite  variety  of  other  materials,  it  requires  all  the  aid  that 
science  can  afford  to  make  it  fully  available  for  human  purposes. 
Century  follows  century,  each  in  succession  casting  new  light  on  its 
various  properties,  and  with  each  of  them  is  produced  a  power  for 
greater  combinations  of  effort,  and  a  necessity  for  their  existence. 
Thus  promoting  association  it  is  the  great  civilizer,  and  therefore  is 
it  that  in  the  extent  and  growth  of  its  use  we  find  the  truest  standard 
by  which  to  test  the  existence  and  the  growth  of  civilization.  That 
admitted,  and  it  cannot  be  denied,  we  may  now  proceed  to  inquire 
what  has  been  the  extent  of  its  use  among  ourselves,  and  how  far 
its  several  stages  of  growth  and  decline  have  been  attended,  on  the 
one  hand  by  peace  and  harmony  at  home,  accompanied  by  growing 
steadiness  of  the  societary  movement ;  and,  on  the  other,  by  those 
frightful  crises  by  which  that  movement  has  so  often  been  arrested, 
and  which  can  be  regarded  only  as  the  evidences  of  growing  bar- 
barism. 

Forty  years  since,  our  annual  product  of  this  greatest  of  all 


metals  did  not  exceed  50,000  tons.  Under  the  semi -protective  tariff 
of  1824  there  was  a  steady  increase,  but  it  was  not  until  after  the 
establishment  of  the  thoroughly  protective  tariff  of  1828  that  the 
manufacture  attained  any  large  development.  By  1832  the  pro- 
duct had  reached  210,000  tons,  and  there  was  then  every  reason  to 
believe  that  in  a  brief  period  the  whole  demand  would  be  supplied 
at  home.  Prosperity  then  reigned  throughout  the  land.  Public 
and  private  revenues  were  large,  and  the  national  debt  was  in  course 
of  rapid  annihilation.  That,  however,  not  being  the  state  of  things 
desired  by  "the  wealthy  capitalists"  of  England,  railroad  managers 
were  set  to  work  in  and  out  of  Congress,  and  railroad  bars  were 
made  wholly  free,  while  the  duties  on  other  commodities  were 
left  in  a  great  degree  unchanged.  Shortly  after  this,  however, 
agitation  succeeded  in  producing  a  total  change  of  system,  the  tariff 
of  1833  having  provided  for  a  gradual  diminution  of  all  duties, 
those  on  iron  included,  until,  in  1842,  they  should  stand  at  a  dead 
level  of  20  per  cent.  Thenceforward  the  building  of  furnaces  and 
mills  almost  wholly  ceased,  the  "  wealthy  English  capitalists"  having 
thus  succeeded  in  regaining  the  desired  control  of  the  great  Ameri- 
can market  for  cloth  and  iron  that  had  been  so  nearly  lost  to  them. 
As  a  consequence  of  their  triumph  there  ensued  a  succession  of 
crises  of  barbaric  tendency,  the  whole  terminating,  in  1842,  in  a 
scene  of  ruin  such  as  had  never  before  been  known,  bankruptcy 
among  the  people  being  almost  universal,  the  banks  throughout  a 
large  portion  of  the  country  being  in  a  state  of  suspension,  States 
being  in  a  condition  of  repudiation,  and  the  national  treasury  being 
wholly  unable  to  meet  its  small  engagements.  Only  seven  years 
before,  under  protection,  it  had  paid  off,  to  the  last  dollar,  the  debt 
of  the  Revolution, 

In  1832,  as  has  been  shown,  the  domestic  production  of  iron 
having  risen  to  210,000  tons,  civilization  was  rapidly  advancing, 
with  growing  power  among  the  people  to  contribute  to  the  sup- 
port of  Government.  Ten  years  later,  with  a  population  one- 
third  greater,  the  total  production  of  iron  being  but  230,000  tons, 
we  find  a  growing  barbarism,  attended  with  corresponding  decline 
in  the  power  of  the  people  to  pay  for  maintenance  of  the  trivial 
fleets  and  armies  that  then  were  needed  for  self-defence.  Such  was 
the  result  of  the  employment  by  British  capitalists  of  that  "great 
instrument  of  warfare  against  the  competing  capital  of  other  coun- 
tries," by  means  of  which  they  have  thus  far  succeeded  in  rendering 


5 

the  Declaration  of  Independence,  issued  in  1176,  a  mere  form  of 
words,  and  so  destined  to  remain  until  our  people  shall  fully  learn 
that  combination  for  our  subjugation  needs  to  be  met  by  combina- 
tion for  self-defence. 

Universal  distress  producing  a  universal  demand  for  remedy,  it 
was  furnished  by  the  establishment  of  that  highly  protective  tariff 
of  1842,  under  the  influence  of  which,  in  less  than  half  a  dozen 
years,  the  production  of  iron  was  carried  up  to  800,000  tons,  and 
the  total  consumption  of  foreign  and  domestic  to  900,000.  Six 
years  previously,  under  British  free  trade,  it  had  been  only  300,000. 
Here  was  evidence  of  advancing  civilization,  and  it  was  accompanied 
by  that  higher  evidence  which  was  furnished  by  the  facts  that  indi- 
viduals, banks,  and  States  resumed  payment  of  their  debts,  while 
the  treasury  was  enabled  not  only  to  meet  the  usual  demands  upon 
it,  but  also  to  provide,  and  that  without  the  slightest  difficulty,  for 
the  expenses  of  the  war  with  Mexico.  Throughout  this  period 
there  was  no  excitement,  nor  was  there  any  crisis.  All  was  peace 
and  harmony,  and  everywhere  in  the  land  there  was  evidence  of 
rapidly  advancing  civilization. 

The  proverb  says  most  truly  that  "  you  may  bray  a  fool  in  a 
mortar,  yet  will  his  foolishness  not  depart  from  him."  Never,  how- 
ever, has  its  truth  been  more  fully  proved  than  in  these  United  States. 
Their  people  had  been  "brayed"  in  the  British  free  trade  "mortar" 
in  the  terrible  period  from  1815  to  1825.  They  had  been  restored 
to  perfect  health  in  the  protectionist  period  from  1825  to  1835. 
They  had  again  been  "brayed,"  and  to  an  extent  that  till  then 
had  not  been  paralleled,  in  the  years  from  1835  to  1842.  Pro- 
tection had  again  restored  them  in  the  brief  period  from  1842  to 
1846  ;  yet  did  they  remain  so  "foolish"  as  to  prove  themselves  once 
again  open  to  the  blandishments  of  their  excellent  friends  beyond 
the  ocean,  "the  wealthy  capitalists"  of  Britain,  who  had  been  en- 
riched by  means  of  buying  their  rabbit  skins  at  sixpence  each  and 
then  reselling  to  them  the  tails  at  a  shilling,  and  who  now  found 
themselves  in  danger  of  wholly  losing  the  "foreign  markets"  they 
had  so  long  labored  to  secure.  As  usual,  agitation  was  recom- 
menced. British  agents,  with  stocks  of  cheap  British  goods,  were 
sent  to  Washington,  and  the  halls  of  the  Capitol  were  granted  to 
them  for  the  exhibition  of  their  wares.  Large  sums  were  raised  in 
England,  and  politicians  here  were  subsidized.  Estimates  were 
furnished  to  the  Senate,  in  which  it  was  shown  that  the  taxation 


6 

imposed  by  the  tariff  was  so  oppressive  that  a  ton  of  nails  which 
could  be  bought  for  $90,  really  cost  the  purchaser  $105  more  than 
it  would  have  done  under  a  free  trade  system ;  and  that  a  pound 
of  Missouri  lead,  that  could  then  be  bought  in  New  Orleans  for 
2f  cents,  actually  cost  the  consumer  three  cents  more  than  he  would 
have  had  to  pay  had  he  been  permitted  to  get  his  lead  free  of  duty 
from  Spain  or  England.  Such  were  the  "instruments  of  warfare" 
used  on  that  occasion  for  beating  down  the  system  under^  which  the 
country  had  so  rapidly  recovered  from  the  effects  of  the  free  trade 
tariff  of  1833.  Such  were  the  frauds  by  means  of  which  the  tariff 
of  1846  was  forced  upon  a  country  that  had  already,  in  the  short 
period  of  thirty  years,  twice  been  "brayed"  in  the  free  trade  "mor- 
tar," and  twice  had  found  the  effects  thereof  iu  an  almost  entire 
stoppage  of  the  societary  circulation,  and  an  almost  absolute  bank- 
ruptcy of  the  farmers,  traders,  bankers,  and  manufacturers  of  the 
country. 

Nominally,  that  tariff  came  into  operation  at  the  end  of  1846. 
Really,  it  became  operative  in  the  summer  of  1848,  the  Irish  famine 
of  184T  having  produced  a  state  of  things,  both  abroad  and  at 
home,  that  much  delayed^its  destructive  action.  From  that  moment 
furnaces  and  rolling  mills  went  gradually  out  of  action  until,  in  1850, 
the  quantity  of  iron  produced  had  fallen  to  less  than  500,000  tons. 
Was  the  deficiency  made  up  by  importation  ?  It  was  not,  the  im- 
port of  that  year  having  exceeded  that  of  1846  by  only  270,000. 
The  whole  consumption  was,  therefore,  little  more  than  previously 
had  been  the  domestic  product  alone.  Nevertheless,  our  popula- 
tion had  then  increased  but  little  less  than  ten  per  cent.  We 
see  thus,  that  while  consumption  advances  under  protection  at  a 
rate  five  times  more  rapid  than  that  of  population,  it  declines  when- 
ever the  " wealthy  capitalists"  obtain  the  control  of  the  "foreign 
markets"  to  which  they  look  with  such  great  anxiety,  and  for  which 
they  are  always  ready  to  use  that  great  "instrument  of  warfare" 
that  we,  in  our  marvellous  folly,  have  placed  in  their  hands,  by 
means  of  selling  skins  for  sixpence  and  taking  our  pay  in  tails  at 
a  shilling. 

The  duty  under  the  tariff  of  1842  being  specific,  it  underwent  no 
change  when  prices  fell  in  England.  To  its  full  amount,  therefore, 
it  constituted  an  obstacle  to  importation  that  it  was  for  the 
British  iron  master  to  .remove,  paying  the  cost  of  removal  out  of 
his  own  pocket  and  into  the  Treasury  of  the  Union.  As  a  conse- 


7 

quence  of  this  the  import  of  rails  in  the  fiscal  year  1846-7,  when 
the  country  was  so  highly  prosperous,  was  but  one-half  as  great  as 
the  average  of  the  two  years  preceding  the  passage  of  the  act  of 
1842;  whereas,  the  domestic  production  had  risen  to  41,000  tons, 
or  little  less  than  double  the  number  imported  in  those  thoroughly 
free  trade  years.  The  total  consumption  had  more  than  doubled  in 
the  short  period  which  had  then  elapsed,  and  had  thus  given  evi- 
dence that  thorough  protection  and  civilization  were  marching  hand 
in  hand  together. 

The  tariff  of  1846,  with  its  ad  valorem  duties,  came  into  opera- 
tion on  the  first  of  December  of  that  year,  the  rate  payable  by  iron 
being  30  per  cent.  Fraudulent  invoices  reduced  it,  probably,  to  little 
more  than  20  per  cent.  American  competition  had  greatly  lowered 
the  real  British  prices,  as  a  consequence  of  which  the  amount  paid 
into  the  treasury  by  foreign  iron  and  the  freight  from  England 
combined,  during  a  period  of  several  years,  were  less  than  the  mere 
cost  of  transportation  from  the  furnaces  of  Pennsylvania  to  the  city 
of  Boston.  The  "wealthy  English  capitalists"  now  profited,  and 
to  the  fullest  extent,  of  the  opportunity  thus  afforded  them  "to  de- 
stroy foreign  competition  and  to  gain  and  keep  possession  of  foreign 
markets."  In  1849  and  1850  the  quantity  of  foreign  rails  forced 
on  the  American  market  amounted  to  more  than  200,000  tons, 
while  the  domestic  production  of  those  years  averaged  but  16,500, 
although  there  then  existed  American  mills  capable  of  producing 
nearly  70,000,  and  those  in  a  country  in  which  eight  years  before 
not  a  single  rail  had  yet  been  made. 

The  furnace  master  found  his  market  destroyed  by  the  closing  of 
the  rolling  mill,  and  the  owner  of  the  latter  found  himself  being 
ruined  by  the  liberal  use  that  then  was  being  made  of  those  "great 
instruments  of  warfare,"  by  means  of  which  the  "wealthy  capital- 
ists" of  England  had  so  long  been  accustomed  to  annihilate  "the 
competing  capital  of  other  countries."  In  their  distress  they  called 
on  Congress  for  help,  but  their  cries  were  totally  unheeded.  British 
iron,  at  the  then  freights,  and  almost  free  of  duty,  could  be  delivered 
here,  as  then  was  shown,  at  $40  per  ton;  and  railroad  makers  pre- 
ferred to  pay  that  price  for  the  miserable  products  of  British  fur- 
naces, to  giving  a  sliding  scale  that  would  secure  to  the  American 
producer,  for  sound  and  excellent  iron,  the  small  price  of  $50,  which 
was  all  that  then  was  asked.  Closing  their  eyes  to  the  fact  that  it 
was  to  American  competition  for  the  sale  of  iron  they  had  been 


8 

indebted  for  the  low  prices  of  the  British  markets,  tney  permitted 
that  competition  to  be  almost  annihilated,  and  the  competitors  to 
be  ruined.  The  fall  of  the  domestic  production  from  800,000  tons 
to  less  than  half  a  million,  produced  a  necessity  for  dispensing  with 
its  use,  or  going  abroad  to  purchase  all  the  difference.  Competition 
for  purchase  in  the  British  market  grew  as  this  necessity  increased, 
and  therewith  came  the  precise  state  of  things  so  well  described  in 
the  Report  to  which  I  have  so  frequently  referred — the  whole  British 
iron  trade  having  been  "enabled  to  step  in  when  prices  revived,  and 
to  carry  on  a  great  business"  before  their  American  competitors  could 
"establish  a  competition  in  prices  with  any  chances  of  success." 
With  the  discovery  of  California  gold  there  arose  a  great  demand 
for  railroad  iron,  and  that  demand  was,  for  the  first  few  years,  sup- 
plied almost  entirely  from  British  rolling  mills,  the  railroad  makers 
paying  $80  per  ton,  if  not  even  more,  when  but  a  little  before 
they  had  refused  to  the  domestic  producer  a  sliding  scale  that  would 
have  secured  him  in  the  receipt  of  $50.  At  enormous  prices  Britain 
supplied  us,  in  the  four  years  1851-54,  with  no  less  than  a  million 
tons  of  railroad  bars.  The  additional  price  paid  in  those  years  by 
American  road-makers,  as  penalty  for  permitting  American  compe- 
tition to  be  crushed  out,  could  not  have  been  less  than  $30,000,000, 
all  of  which  went  into  British  pockets,  and  thus  helped  to  prepare 
the  way  for  that  new  evidence  of  growing  barbarism  which  was 
furnished  by  the  terrific  crisis  of  1857. 

In  that  crisis  very  many  of  our  iron  producers  were  totally  ruined, 
and  the  ruin  extended  itself  to  all  departments  of  industry  connected 
with  this  branch  of  manufacture.  The  demand  for  coal  diminished, 
and  labor  ceased  to  be  required ;  as  a  necessary  consequence  of  which 
immigration  rapidly  declined,  while  emigration  to  Australia,  com- 
bined with  return  of  the  many  disappointed,  withdrew  from  us  pro- 
bably one-fourth  of  all  who  then  were  led  to  seek  our  shores. 

At  the  breaking  out  of  the  rebellion  we  had  been  for  a  whole 
decade  in  the  ownership  of  mines  that  had  yielded  gold  to  the  extent 
of  more  than  $500,000,000,  and  yet  we  had  not  been  able  even  to 
pay  our  way  with  Europe.  Our  foreign  debts  were  probably  equal 
to  that  sum  in  their  amount.  Our  credit  was  so  verylow  that  there 
existed  little  disposition  to  purchase  further  supplies  of  bonds.  As 
a  consequence  of  this,  the  importation  of  railroad  iron  in  the  three 
years  1858-60  averaged  but  88,000  tons,  and  the  total  consumption 
of  iron,  foreign  and  domestic,  but  little  exceeded  that  of  the  closing 


9 

year  of  that  prosperous  protective  period  which  terminated  in 
1847-8.  There  is  good  reason  for  believing  that  it  did  not  exceed 
a  million  of  tons,  and  yet  in  the  period  which  had  since  elapsed  our 
population  must  have  increased  more  than  40  per  cent.  Taking 
then  the  consumption  of  iron  as  the  test  of  civilization,  we  are  pre- 
sented with  the  following  facts  : — 

In  the  six  years  which  followed  the  passage  of  the  protective  act 
of  1842  the  consumption  of  iron  trebled,  while  the  population  in- 
creased but  20  per  cent. 

At  the  end  of  twelve  years  from  the  re-establishment  of  British 
free  trade,  there  was  but  a  slight  increase,  although  the  numbers  of 
our  people  had  grown  40  per  cent. 

Bad  as  was  all  this,  it  was  but  the  preparation  for  those  further 
acts  of  barbarism  which  distinguished  the  close  of  1860,  and  resulted 
in  a  civil  war  that  has  cost  the  country  hundreds  of  thousands  of 
lives,  and  thousands  of  millions  of  dollars.  Seeking  now  to  find 
the  real  cause  of  that  war,  and  of  the  destruction  of  life  and  pro- 
perty of  which  it  has  been  the  cause,  I  would  ask  of  you,  my  dear 
sir,  to  read  again  the  Parliamentary  Report  of  the  British  policy, 
and  then  to  study  carefully  the  following  exhibit  of  the  natural 
advantages  of  an  important  portion  of  the  country  that  now  pre- 
sents such  a  scene  of  devastation. 

The  great  backbone  of  the  Union  is  found  in  the  ridge  of  moun- 
tains Vhich  commences  in  Alabama  but  little  distant  from  the  Gulf 
of  Mexico,  and  extends  northward,  wholly  separating  the  people 
who  inhabit  the  low  lands  of  the  Atlantic  slope  from  those  who 
occupy  such  lands  in  the  Mississippi  valley,  and  itself  constituting 
a  great  free  soil  wedge,  with  its  attendant  free  atmosphere,  created 
by  nature  herself  in  the  very  heart  of  slavery,  and  requiring  but  a 
slight  increase  of  size  and  strength  to  have  enabled  its  people  to 
control  the  southern  policy,  and  thus  to  have  brought  the  entire 
South  into  perfect  harmony  with  the  North  and  West,  and  with 
the  world  at  large.  That  yon  may  fully  satisfy  yourself  on  this 
head,  I  will  now  ask  you  to  take  the  map  and  pass  your  eye  down 
the  Alleghany  ridge,  flanked  as  it  is  by  the  Cumberland  range  on 
the  west,  and  by  that  of  the  Blue  Mountain  on  the  east,  giving,  in 
the  very  heart  of  the  South  itself,  a  country  larger  than  all  Great 
Britain,  in  which  the  finest  of  climates  is  found  in  connection  with 
land  abounding  in  coal,  salt,  limestone,  iron  ore,  gold,  and  almost 


10 

every  other  material  required  for  the  development  of  a  varied  in- 
dustry, and  for  securing  the  attainment  of  the  highest  degree  of 
agricultural  wealth ;  and  then  to  reflect  that  it  is  a  region  which 
must  necessarily  be  occupied  by  men  who  with  their  own  hands  till 
their  own  lauds,  and  one  in  which  slavery  can  never  by  any  possi- 
bility have  more  than  a  slight  and  transitory  existence.  That  done, 
I  will  ask  of  you  here  to  reflect  what  would  be  now  the  condition 
of  the  Union  had  its  policy  for  the  last  twenty  years  been  such  as 
would  have  tended  towards  filling  this  great  free  soil  wedge  with 
free  white  northern  men — miners,  smelters,  founders,  machinists — 
workmen  of  all  descriptions — who  should  have  been  making  a  market 
for  every  product  of  the  farm,  with  constant  increase  in  the  value 
of  land  and  labor,  and  as  constantly  growing  tendency  towards  in- 
crease of  freedom  for  all  men,  whether  black  or  white?  Would  not, 
under  such  circumstances,  power  have  made  its  way  to  the  hills,  and 
would  not  iron,  coal,  limestone,  and  copper  have  been  enabled  to 
dictate  law  to  the  cotton  kings — to  the  men  who  occupied  on  the 
river  bottoms,  and  lived  at  ease  at  the  cost  of  those  of  their  fellow- 
men  whom  they  bought  and  sold  in  the  open  market?  Could  we,  by 
any  possibility,  have  witnessed  the  present  extraordinary  state  of 
things,  had  the  policy  of  the  country  in  reference  to  domestic  and 
foreign  commerce  not  been  directed  by  the  "wealthy  capitalists" 
who  are  now  so  busily  engaged  in  making  rat-holes  through  the 
existing  tariff,  very  moderately  protective  as  it  is?  Most  assuredly 
we  should  not.  To  them  it  is  that  we  are  indebted  for  our  present 
troubles  and  our  debt,  and  o/them  it  is  we  should  exact  the  payment 
of  it.  That,  however,  we  shall  never  do  if  we  shall  continue  to  sell 
rabbit  skins  for  sixpence  and  take  our  pay  in  rabbit  tails  for  a 
shilling. 

Why  have  we  so  long  continued  so  to  do  ?  Because,  although 
Independence  was  declared  in  1776,  we  have  never  pursued  the 
policy  required  for  making  the  declaration  any  more  than  a  mere 
word  of  small  significance.  With  slight  exception  we  have  been 
governed  by  the  great  capitalists  of  Britain,  and  have  pursued  tht 
precise  system  that  was  advocated  in  England  before  the  Revolution 
as  the  one  required  for  retaining  the  Colonies  in  a  state  of  vassalage, 
and  thus  compelling  them  to  so  make  the  unprofitable  exchanges  to 
which  I  have  referred.  What  was  that  system  is  fully  shown  in  an 
English  work  of  much  ability,  published  in  London  at  the  time 
when  Franklin  was  urging  upon  his  countrymen  the  diversification 


11 

of  their  pursuits,  as  the  only  road  towards  real  independence,  and 
from  which  the  following  is  an  extract : — 

"The  population,  from  being  spread  round  a  great  extent  of  fron- 
tier, would  increase  without  giving  the  least  cause  of  jealousy  to 
Britain ;  land  would  not  only  be  plentiful,  but  plentiful  where  our 
people  wanted  it,  whereas,  at  present,  the  population  of  our  colo- 
nies, especially  the  central  ones,  is  confined  ;  they  have  spread  over 
all  the  space  between  the  sea  and  the  mountains,  the  consequence  of 
which  is,  that  land  is  becoming  scarce,  that  which  is  good  having 
all  been  planted.  The  people,  therefore,  find  themselves  too  nume- 
rous for  the  agriculture,  which  is  the  first  step  to  becoming  manu- 
facturers, that  step  which  Britain  has  so  much  reason  to  dread." 

Why,  my  dear  sir,  should  Britain  have  so  much  dreaded  combina- 
tion among  her  colonial  subjects?  Why  should  she  so  sedulously 
have  sought  to  disperse  them  over  the  extensive  tracts  of  land 
beyond  the  mountains  ?  Because,  the  more  they  scattered  the  more 
dependent  they  could  be  kept,  and  the  more  readily  they  could  be 
compelled  to  carry  all  their  rude  products  to  a  distant  market,  there 
to  sell  them  so  cheaply,  as  we  are  told  by  another  distinguished 
British  writer,  "that  not  one-fourth  of  the  product  redounded  to 
their  own  profit,"  as  a  consequence  of  which  plantation  mortgages 
were  most  abundant,  and  the  rate  of  interest  charged  upon  them  so 
very  high  as  generally  to  eat  the  mortgagor  out  of  house  and  home. 
In  a  word,  the  system  of  that  day,  as  described  by  those  writers, 
was  almost  precisely  that  of  the  present  hour.  For  its  maintenance, 
dispersion  of  the  population  was  regarded  as  indispensable,  and  that 
it  might  be  attained,  the  course  of  action  here  described  was  recom- 
mended : — 

"Nothing  can  therefore  be  more  politic  than  to  provide  a  super- 
abundance of  colonies  to  take  off  all  those  people  that  find  a  want 
of  land  in  our  old  settlements ;  and  it  may  not  be  one  or  two  tracts 
of  country  that  will  answer  this  purpose  :  provision  should  be  made 
for  the  convenience  of  some,  the  inclination  of  others,  and  every 
measure  taken  to  inform  the  people  of  the  colonies  that  were  grow- 
ing too  populous,  that  land  was  plentiful  in  other  places,  and  granted 
on  the  easiest  terms  ;  and  if  such  inducements  were  not  found  suffi- 
cient for  thinning  the  country  considerably,  government  should  by 
all  means  be  at  the  expense  of  transporting  them.  Notice  should 
be  given  that  sloops  would  be  always  ready  at  Fort  Pitt,  or  as  much 
higher  on  the  Ohio  as  is  navigable,  for  carrying  all  furniture  without 
expense,  to  whatever  settlement  they  chose,  on  the  Ohio  or  Missis- 
sippi. Such  measures,  or  similar  ones,  would  carry  off  the  surplus 
of  population  in  the  central  and  southern  colonies,  which  have  been 


12 

and  will  every  day  be  more  and  more  the  foundation  of  manufac- 
tures." 

Having  studied  these  recommendations  in  regard  to  the  mainte- 
nance of  colonial  dependence,  I  will  ask  you  now  to  study  the  work- 
ing of  the  British  free  trade  system,  and  satisfy  yourself  that  its 
advocates,  the  agitators  of  whom  I  have  spoken,  have  been  mere 
instruments  of  our  foreign  masters — closing  our  mills,  furnaces,  and 
factories,  retarding  the  development  of  our  great  mineral  treasures, 
preventing  the  utilization  of  our  vast  water  powers,  and  in  this 
manner  scattering  our  people,  in  strict  accordance  with  the  orders 
of  those  British  traders  against  whom  our  predecessors  made  the 
Revolution. 

Having  now  brought  up  this  review  of  the  iron  trade  to  the 
period  of  the  great  rebellion,  I  propose  in  another  letter  to  bring 
it  down  to  the  present  time,  and  then  to  show  what  are  the  mea- 
sures by  which  we  may  be  enabled  to  outdo  England  without  fighting 
her,  and  thus  establish  a  real  independence. 

Yours,  very  truly, 

HENRY  C.  CAREY. 

Hon.  SCHUTLER  COLFAX. 
PHILADELPHIA,  Jan.  6,  1865. 


THE  IROX  QUESTION. 


LETTER   SIXTH. 

DEAR  SIR  : — 

THE  preparation  seems  to  have  now  been  made  for  boring 
another  hole  through  the  protective  system  that  has  recently  been 
so  well  established.  This  time  it  takes  the  form  of  a  protest,  of 
course  in  favor  of  the  public  revenue,  against  duties  on  spool  cot- 
ton, under  which,  as  we  are  told,  "  foreign  spinners  are  now  suffer- 
ing in  their  attempts  to  contend  against  these  heavy  odds  whereby 
importation  is  now  stopped."  Large  exhibits  are  made  therein  of 
the  quantity  of  gold  that  is  thus  prevented  from  passing  into  the 
treasury,  but  not  a  word  is  said  in  reference  to  the  important  fact, 
that,  under  the  system  which  has  thus  far  made  us  dependent  on 
Britain  for  that  important  commodity,  we  have  never  yet  been  able 
to  carry  up  our  consumption  even  to  the  amount  of  six  cents  per 
head  of  our  population.  Selling  cotton  at  three  or  four  pence 
per  pound  we  have  been  required  to  pay  in  gold,  to  the  extent  of 
millions  of  dollars  per  annum,  for  pennyweights  of  it  combined  with 
Russian  and  Egyptian  corn,  while  the  farmer  of  Iowa,  unable  to 
find  a  market  for  his  grain,  has  found  it  expedient  to  convert  it  into 
fuel,  and  thus  prevent  its  total  waste.  Here,  as  everywhere,  we 
have  been  favoring  the  policy  of  slavery  and  barbarism,  limiting  our 
people  to  the  raising  of  raw  produce  for  the  supply  of  distant 
masters,  by  whom  they  have  been  required  to  give  the  whole  skin 
for  a  sixpence,  receiving  their  pay  in  tails  at  a  shilling.  The 
answer  to  all  that  is  now  said  in  regard  to  the  opening  of  the  new 
rat-hole  which  is  now  proposed,  is  found  in  the  words  of  the  ex- 
cellent article  from  the  Herald,  a  part  of  which  was  appended  to  a 
former  letter :  "  If  the  price  is  very  large  and  the  demand  is  great, 
manufactories  will  spring  abundantly  into  existence  and  prices 
will  find  their  natural  level."  If  the  British  manufacturers  are 
really  suffering  in  the  manner  above  described,  let  them  transfer 


14 

themselves  and  their  machinery  here ;  let  them  bring  their  people 
with  them  to  eat  the  food  of  Illinois  and  Iowa  in  place  of  that  of 
Egypt :  let  them  do  this  and  the  price  of  their  commodity  will  soon 
be  so  far  lessened  that  our  consumption  will  rise  to  20  cents  per 
head ;  the  Government  will  then  receive,  in  the  form  of  internal 
revenue,  au  amount  far  greater  than  these  foreign  agitators  ever 
yet  have  paid  at  the  custom-house ;  and  we  shall  then  have  made  a 
further  step  towards  enabling  ourselves  to  retain  at  home  the  gold 
that  we  ourselves  shall  so  much  need  when  the  time  shall  have 
arrived  for  using  the  precious  metals  in  the  place  of  paper. 

Having  thus  disposed  of  this  new  subject  of  agitation,  the  further 
examination  of  the  great  Iron  Question  comes  now  next  in  order. 

To  British  free  trade  it  is,  as  I  have  shown,  that  we  stand  indebted 
for  the  present  civil  war.  Had  our  legislation  been  of  the  kind 
which  was  needed  for  giving  effect  to  the  Declaration  of  Indepen- 
dence, that  great  hill  region  of  the  South,  one  of  the  richest,  if  not 
absolutely  the  richest  in  the  world,  would  long  since  have  been  filled 
with  furnaces  and  factories,  the  laborers  in  which  would  have  been 
free  men,  women,  and  children,  white  and  black,  and  the  several 
portions  of  the  Union  would  have  been  linked  together  by  hooks  of 
steel  that  would  have  set  at  defiance  every  effort  of  the  "  wealthy 
capitalists"  of  England  for  bringing  about  a  separation.  Such, 
however,  and  most  unhappily,  was  not  our  course  of  operation. 

Rebellion,  therefore,  came,  bringing  with  it  an  almost  entire  stop- 
page of  the  societary  movement,  with  ruin  to  a  large  proportion  of 
those  of  the  men  engaged  in  producing  coal  and  iron  who  had  still 
continued  to  exist  notwithstanding  the  heavy  losses  inflicted  upon 
them  in  the  sad  five  years  which  had  just  then  elapsed.  More  than 
at  any  previous  period  the  Government  stood  then  in  need  of  iron 
in  all  its  shapes,  from  the  needle  with  which  the  poor  sewing  wo- 
man makes  the  shirt,  to  the  great  sheet  required  for  plating  the 
enormous  ship  of  war ;  and  yet,  such  had  been  the  extraordinary 
policy  of  the  country  that,  while  fuel  abounded  rolling  mills  were 
idle  and  furnaces  were  out  of  blast,  and  the  machinery  for  the  needle 
and  the  plate  had  not  as  yet  been  permitted  to  take  its  place  at  any 
single  point  over  our  extensive  surface.  As  a  consequence,  poor  as 
was  then  our  Government,  and  unemployed  as  were  then  so  large  a 
portion  of  our  people,  we  were  compelled  to  send  abroad  for  millions 
upon  millions  of  dollars  worth  of  the  machinery  of  war,  and  there 
to  encounter  all  the  obstacles  that  could  decently  be  thrown  in  our 


15 

way  by  men  who  prayed  openly  for  the  success  of  the  rebellion,  and 
who,  almost  at  the  instant  of  its  first  occurrence,  had,  by  royal  pro- 
clamation, placed  the  rebel  Government  on  a  level  with  that  which 
their  predecessors  had,  in  1783,  so  unwillingly  recognized.  This 
great  adversity  had,  however,  brought  with  it  a  remedy  that,  if  now 
properly  applied,  will  cause  our  children  and  our  children's  children 
to  look  back  to  the  period  of  its  occurrence  as  that  in  which  there 
had  been  an  act  of  Providential  interference  in  favor  of  a  commu- 
nity such  as  had  had  no  precedent  in  the  history  of  the  world, 
prompting,  as  it  had  done,  men  who  for  seventy  years  had  wholly 
controlled  the  action  of  the  Government,  to  abdicate  their  seats  and 
leave  the  direction  of  affairs  to  those  who  represented  the  poor  and 
despised  "  mud-sills"  of  northern  States.  So  great  an  act  of  in- 
sanity had  never  before  been  perpetrated  by  any  body  of  intelligent 
men,  and,  most  fortunately,  its  perpetration  occurred  at  the  moment 
when  the  public  opinion  of  the  North  had  been  prepared  to  profit 
of  it. 

That  preparation  had  come  as  a  natural  .consequence  of  the  terrific 
free  trade  crisis  of  1857.  Assembling  in  1860,  the  politicians  at 
Chicago  accepted  most  unwillingly  that  new  plank  of  the  platform 
by  which  "protection  to  the  farmer  in  his  efforts  for  bringing  the 
consumer  to  his  side"  was  incorporated  into  the  Republican  creed ; 
and  great  was  their  surprise  when  they  found  that  public  opinion, 
and  especially  the  opinion  of  the  great  Mississippi  Valley,  had  left 
them  far  behind.  "We  might  have  made  it  stronger,"  was  the 
exclamation  of  one  of  its  chief  opponents  after  he  had  witnessed 
the  enthusiastic  applause  with  which  it  had  been  greeted.  As  yet, 
however,  it  could  be  nothing  more  than  a  declaration  of  good  inten- 
tions to  be  carried  into  effect  at  some  future  time,  the  senatorial 
power  appearing  then  likely  long  to  remain  in  the  hands  of  men 
who  believed  in  human  slavery  as  the  corner-stone  of  all  free  govern- 
ment ;  in  British  free  trade  as  the  means  by  which  slavery  was  to 
be  perpetuated  and  extended  throughout  this  continent ;  and  in  the 
"  wealthy  capitalists"  of  England,  as  the  firm  allies  by  whose  aid 
their  ambitious  hopes  were  to  be  fully  realized.  To  give  prac- 
tical effect  to  the  new  Declaration  of  Independence,  it  was  neces- 
sary that  those  men  should  abdicate,  and  happily  for  the  North, 
and  for  the  world,  abdication  was  not  long  delayed.  Protection 
then  at  once  became  the  law  of  the  land,  and  under  circumstances 
that  should  have  tended  to  free  forever  the  country  from  that  agita- 


16 

tion  by  means  of  which  the  British  trader  had  so  long  controlled 
the  societary  movement,  and  had,  with  so  much  profit  to  himself, 
been  enabled  to  fill  the  British  treasury  by  means  of  taxes,  direct 
and  indirect,  upon  nearly  all  the  foreign  exchanges  that  our  poverty 
had  permitted  us  to  make.  Between  skins  at  sixpence  and  tails  at 
a  shilling — cotton  at  cents  per  pound  and  cotton  goods  at  shillings 
per  ounce — corn  at  cents  per  bushel  and  wool  and  corn  at  dollars 
per  pound — there  was  a  large  margin  for  the  British  trader  and  his 
superiors,  and  out  of  the  taxes  thus  extorted  have,  to  a  large 
extent,  the  British  nation  and  its  government  been  supported  by 
the  people  of  these  United  States.  Protection  looked  to  the  abo- 
lition of  this  taxation.  That  it  has  done  much  in  that  direction  is 
proved  by  the  great  fact,  that  it  has  enabled  us  to  contribute  thou- 
sands of  millions  of  dollars  towards  the  suppression  of  the  rebellion  ; 
that  it  has  in  so  short  a  period  given  us  a  navy  such  as  had  been 
so  long  required  for  setting  at  naught  the  declaration  that  "  not  a 
flag  but  by  permission  spreads ;"  and  that,  notwithstanding  all  our 
vast  expenditures,  the  productive  power  of  the  loyal  States  is  greater 
at  this  moment  than  was  that  of  the  whole  Union  on  the  day  on 
which,  less  than  four  years  since,  President  Lincoln  assumed  the 
reins  of  government. 

The  need  for  iron  soon  became  very  great.  Great,  too,  was  the 
disposition  of  iron  men  to  exert  themselves  for  the  supply  of  the 
wants  the  rebellion  had  now  created.  The  Government  had  just  then 
pledged  itself  to  stand  by  them  in  their  contest  for  the  market  of 
the  world,  at  home  and  abroad,  with  the  men  who  had  so  long  con- 
trolled "  that  great  instrument  of  warfare"  by  whose  judicious  use 
their  predecessors  had  so  generally  been  ruined.  The  pledge  was 
accepted,  and  the  results  exhibit  themselves  in  the  facts  : — 

I.  That  the  production  of  pig-iron  has  already  been  carried  up 
to  more  than  1,300,000  tons,  and  that  it  has  been  made  certain  that 
large  as  is  the  quantity,  it  can  with  ease,  provided  that  the  labor 
can  be  obtained,  be  trebled  in  the  next  seven  years  : 

II.  That  the  rolling-mills  of  the  country  have  now  a  capacity  of 
nearly  700,000  tons,  and  that  the  only  difficulty  now  standing  in 
the  way  of  the  production  of  that  quantity  of  sheet  and  bars  is  the 
one  resulting  from  the  scarcity  of  labor  : 

III.  That  the  supply  of  railroad  iron  is  now  fully  equal  to  the 
demand,  and  can  be  increased  to  any  extent  that  may  be  required  : 

IV.  That  the  conversion  of  iron  into  steel  has  been  so  much  ex- 


n 

tended  as  to  free  us  entirely  from  any  further  dependence  on  the 
"  wealthy  capitalists"  of  Britain  : 

Y.  That  works  required  for  the  conversion  of  steel  and  iron  into 
the  various  other  machinery  required  for  both  public  and  private 
uses  have  been  so  extended  as  to  enable  their  proprietors  to  meet 
the  whole  demand. 

The  industrial  history  of  the  world  exhibits  nothing  at  all  com- 
parable with  what  has  here  been  done  in  regard  to  this  great  branch 
of  manufacture.  That  it  might  be  done  every  man  who  previously 
had  been  interested  therein  has  been  required  to  apply  to  the  en- 
largement and  improvement  of  his  machinery  not  only  every  dollar 
that  he  could  make,  but,  in  very  many  cases,  all  that  he  could  bor- 
row ;  and  this  they  have  done  in  the  false  confidence  that  consumers 
of  iron  had  at  last  so  far  profited  of  past  experience  as  to  have 
become  convinced  that  the  way  to  have  good  and  cheap  iron  was 
to  be  found  in  the  direction  of  stimulating  competition  for  its 
manufacture ;  and  not  in  that  of  annihilating  American  competi- 
tion for  its  sale,  while  promoting  competition  for  its  purchase  from 
the  very  men  who  had  always  used  their  power  in  the  direction  of 
promoting  agitation  for  the  destruction  of  "  foreign  competition," 
and  for  enabling  themselves  to  "  gain  and  keep  possession  of  foreign 
markets." 

That  it  was  a  false  confidence  you  will,  my  dear  sir,  see,  after  you 
shall  have  accompanied  me  in  a  brief  review  of  the  proceedings  of 
iron  consumers  which  it  is  proposed  now  to  make.  When  you  shall 
so  have  done,  you  will,  as  I  think,  agree  with  me  that  it  would  be 
difficult  to  find  in  the  history  of  the  world  a  case  in  which  the  pro- 
verb given  in  my  last  had  been  more  thoroughly  applicable  than 
it  now  is  in  reference  to  the  iron  consumers  of  these  United  States. 
Often  as  they  had  been  "brayed"  in  the  British  free  trade  "mortar," 
their  "foolishness"  had  not  departed  from  them. 

By  the  tariff  of  1861  the  duty  on  railroad  iron  was  fixed  at 
$12  per  ton  of  2,240  pounds,  being  less  than  one-half  of  the 
charge  upon  it  as  established  by  the  tariff  of  1842 — that  one 
under  which  iron  generally  was  so  cheaply  furnished  that  the 
total  consumption  of  the  country  was  in  four  years  carried  up 
from  300,000  to  900,000  tons.  It  should  have  been  placed  at  a 
higher  rate  than  this,  and  so  it  would  have  been  but  for  the  ex- 
ceedingly absurd  and  stupid  jealousy  which  prompts  so  many  persons 
to  consider  the  iron  manufacture  the  special  property  of  Pennsyl- 


18 

vania.  Iron  ore  abounds  in  more  than  two-thirds  of  the  States  of 
the  Union  ;  fuel,  too,  almost  as  much  abounding  as  the  ore  demand- 
ing to  be  smelted;  and  it  is  to  the  great  credit  of  Pennsylvania  that 
her  ironmasters  have  never  in  a  single  instance  allowed  themselves 
to  be  influenced  by  the  narrow  idea,  elsewhere  openly  expressed  in 
regard  to  other  branches  of  manufacture,  that  it  was  needed  to 
"keep  protection  down,  lest  it  might  stimulate  domestic  compe- 
tition." If  there  are  any  ironmasters  in  the  country  who  can  live 
without  protection,  they  are  those  of  that  State.  They  are  the 
men  who  have  paid  most  dearly  for  their  experience.  To  them  the 
country  is  indebted  for  the  fact  that  this  great  branch  of  manufac- 
ture, in,  nearly  all  its  processes,  is  now  ahead  of  Britain.  They, 
however,  know  that  Tennessee  and  Alabama,  Missouri  and  Michi- 
gan, Virginia,  Maryland,  and  Ohio,  need  protection;  and  they  desire 
that  they  shall  have  it,  quite  assured  that  in  the  wide  extension  and 
general  prosperity  of  the  manufacture  in  which  they  are  so  well 
engaged  will  be  found  the  key  to  that  universal  prosperity  which 
enables  men  to  extend  their  roads,  to  increase  and  improve  their 
machinery,  and  to  do  all  those  things  that  make  demand  for 
iron  and  thus  furnish  proof  conclusive  of  advancing  civilization. 
Least  in  need  of  it,  they  stand  foremost  in  the  demand  for  efficient 
protection,  asking  it  in  the  interest  of  the  country  at  large,  and  not, 
as  is  in  so  many  other  cases  done,  exclusively  in  their  own. 

Accepting  the  rate  of  duty  that  had  been  fixed,  they  went 
promptly  to  work,  and  with  the  results  that  have  been  shown. 
The  time  came,  however,  when  it  became  necessary  to  establish  a 
system  of  Internal  Revenue,  and  railroad  iron  was  then  subjected 
to  a  direct  tax  of  $1  50  per  ton,  while  upon  coal  and  other  com- 
modities used  in  its  production  heavy  duties  were  imposed.  Incomes, 
too,  were  required  to  contribute,  the  general  rate  of  contribution, 
by  both  the  manufacturer  and  the  receiver  of  income,  being  fixed  at 
three  per  cent. 

The  war  having  thus  produced  a  necessity  for  taxing  both  the 
materials  of  manufacture  and  its  products,  it  was  deemed  proper  to 
subject  the  foreign  manufacturer  to  the  payment  of  a  like  contribu- 
tion, and  duties  generally  were  raised  to  the  extent  of  Jive  per 
cent.  To  this,  however,  railroad  iron  was  made  an  exception,  the 
addition  having  been  limited  to  the  precise  amount  of  the  direct  tax, 
$1  50  per  ton,  and  no  allowance  whatever  having  been  made  for  the 
taxes  on  coal,  lime,  machinery,  or  incomes.  Such,  my  dear  sir,  was 


19 

the  paltry  spirit  in  which  were  met  the  men  who  were  at  that  mo- 
ment, in  their  efforts  to  meet  the  wants  of  the  Government,  mani- 
festing a  larger  liberality  than  any  other  body  of  men  that  could 
have  been  produced  in  the  whole  extent  of  the  Union. 

The  necessity  for  further  revenue  becoming  obvious,  the  last 
session  of  Congress  gave  us  a  new  excise  law  by  means  of  which 
pig  metal  was  for  the  first  time  subjected  to  a  tax,  and  that  to  the 
extent  of  two  dollars  per  ton,  the  tax  on  coal  being  at  the  same 
time  largely  increased,  and  that  on  rails  more  than  doubled,  the 
general  effect  being  that  of  giving  a  tax  on  the  rail  itself  amounting 
to  seven  dollars  per  ton. 

To  this  must  now  be  added  taxes  on  lime  and  other  raw  mate- 
rials— taxes  on  machinery  to  a  large  amount — income  taxes — taxes 
on  licenses — taxes  on  sales — taxes  on  freights — taxes  on  leases — 
taxes  on  salaries — taxes  on  charters,  notes  of  hand,  and  articles  of 
agreement — the  whole  of  which,  when  added  to  the  $7  already  ob- 
tained, will  give  at  least  $8  50  as  the  contribution  in  these  several 
forms  to  be  paid  by  each  ton  of  railroad  bars. — Adding  now  to  this 
the  large  increase,  consequent  upon  the  existence  of  the  war,  of 
state,  county,  township,  and  borough  taxes — the  contributions  for 
obtaining  volunteers  and  for  maintaining  their  families,  it  will  be 
found  that  the  amount,  under  this  new  law,  furnished  by  each  ton 
of  bars,  for  the  maintenance  of  the  contest,  cannot  be  estimated  at 
less  than  $10. 

Having  thus  shown  what  was  the  pressure  brought  by  the 
Government  to  bear  upon  the  men  who  were  giving  all  their  time, 
mind,  and  means  to  building  up  that  great  manufacture  on  which 
now  rests  the  whole  of  our  great  societary  machine,  and  upon  whose 
success  or  failure  is  dependent  the  whole  future  of  this  Union,  I 
propose  in  my  next  to  show  what  were  the  measures  at  the  same 
time  adopted  by  the  Government  for  enabling  them  successfully  to 
compete  with  those  "wealthy  English  capitalists"  who  were  then 
giving  all  their  time,  mind,  and  means  to  the  work  of  vilifying  our 
people,  destroying  our  credit,  breaking  our  blockades,  destroying 
our  ships,  and  in  every  other  way  aiding  a  rebellion  whose  success, 
as  they  saw,  could  have  no  other  result  than  that  of  reducing  the 
country  to  a  state  of  complete  dependence. 

It  is  with  great  regret,  my  dear  sir,  that  I  make  so  many  demands 
upon  your  time  and  attention,  but  the  question  now  to  be  settled  is 
one  of  so  great  importance  that  you  will,  I  am  sure,  excuse  me. 


20 

When  the  present  war  shall  have  been  closed  there  will  be  another 
to  be  fought,  and  that  one  will  be  with  England.  By  many  it  is 
desired  that  it  may  be  a  war  of  cannon  balls  ;  but  it  is  not  now  with 
such  machinery  that  she  chiefly  seeks  to  fight  us.  It  is  in  the  Halls 
of  Congress  she  is  to  be  met,  aiid  the  machinery  with  which  we 
have  successfully  to  meet  her  is  to  be  found  in  the  adoption  of  those 
measures  which  shall  enable  us  most  speedily  to  profit  of  that  inex- 
haustible store  of  fuel  and  of  ores  that  nature  has  placed  at  our 
command.  So  believing,  and  hoping  that  all  my  countrymen  may 
soon  be  led  to  the  conclusion  that  there  really  is  a  way  to  outdo 
England  without  fighting  her,  I  am,  with  great  regard  and  respect, 


Yours,  very  truly, 

HENRY  C.  CAREY. 


Hon.  SCHUYLEE  COLPAX. 
PHILADELPHIA,  Jan.  9,  1865. 


THE  IRON  QUESTION. 


LETTER    SEVENTH. 

DEAR  SIR  : — 

That  the  power  to  prosecute  the  war  in  which  we  are  engaged 
has  been  derived  mainly  from  the  Mining  States,  must  be  obvious 
to  all  who  take  the  trouble  to  reflect  that  for  the  force  by  which 
our  mills  have  been  driven  and  our  blockade  maintained,  and  the 
iron  by  means  of  which  that  force  has  been  applied,  the  Union  has 
had  to  look  almost  entirely  to  the  mountains  of  Pennsylvania.  But 
for  the  energy  with  which  the  mineral  resources  of  that  State  have 
been  developed  the  war  could  not  have  been  maintained  for  even  a 
single  year.  To  their  further  development,  and  to  that  of  her  sister 
Mining  States,  the  Union  has  now  to  stand  indebted  for  its  power 
to  collect  the  revenue  by  means  of  which  its  credit  is  to  be  main- 
tained, its  wars,  present  and  future,  to  be  carried  on,  and  its  debt 
ultimately  discharged.  Failing  to  secure  that  development  it  must 
itself  prove  a  failure,  absolute  and  complete. 

Seeing  this,  and  it  is  so  clearly  obvious  that  it  would  appear  dif- 
ficult that  any  should  fail  to  do  so,  it  might  be  supposed  that  coal 
and  iron,  as  the  foundation  upon  which  now  rests,  and  must  in  all 
the  future  rest,  our  whole  societary  movement,  would,  in  these  trying 
times,  and  after  the  sad  experience  of  the  blessings  of  British  free 
trade,  have  been  regarded  as  entitled  to  peculiar  care.  That  prior 
to  the  last  Session  of  Congress  they  had  not  been  so  regarded,  and 
that,  on  the  contrary,  of  the  little  that  had  been  given  by  one  hand 
much  had  been  taken  away  by  the  other,  has  been  already  shown. 
That  the  movement  since  that  time  has  been  in  the  same  unfortu- 
nate direction,  it  is  proposed  now  to  show. 

The  total  taxation  of  a  ton  of  railroad  bars,  for  the  maintenance 
of  the  war,  cannot  be  taken  at  less  than  $10.  Before  the  passage 
of  any  tax  law  the  duty  had  been  fixed  at  $12,  that  having  been  the 
smallest  sum  to  which  it  had  been  possible  to  obtain  the  assent  of 


the  Mining  States.  Under  the  first  tax  law  the  charges  of  the 
Government  to  the  domestic  producer  may  be  taken  as  having  beea 
not  less  than  $3,  while  the  additional  payment  required  of  the  foreign 
producer  was  limited  to  $1  50.  Since  then  the  former  have  been 
more  than  trebled,  and  it  would  have  been  but  just  to  carry  up  the 
latter  to  the  same  extent,  thereby  compelling  the  British  iron 
master  to  pay  $20.  Instead  of  that,  his  contribution  was  reduced 
to  the  point  at  which  it  had  stood  on  the  day  on  which  Fort  Sumter 
fell.  Such  was  the  manner  in  which  .the  decision  of  the  Chicago 
Convention  was  carried  into  effect  in  regard  to  a  manufacture  upon 
the  success  or  failure  of  which  was  wholly  dependent  the  answer  to 
be  given  to  the  questions  as  to  whether  or  not  the  Government  was 
to  be  sustained ;  whether  or  not  the  interest  on  the  debt  was  to  be 
paid ;  whether  or  not  specie  payments  should  ever  be  resumed ; 
whether  or  not  the  national  debt  should  ever  be  discharged  ? 

It  may,  however,  be  said  that  the  duty  of  $12  is  payable  in  gold, 
while  the  $10  of  taxes  are  payable  in  paper,  and  such  is  certainly 
the  case.  That  difference  now  constitutes  the  sole  protection  to 
this  great  branch  of  manufacture.  When,  however,  is  it  to  cease  ? 
Who  can  tell  what  time  is  to  elapse  before  some  enterprising 
financier  shall  succeed  in  persuading  the  Government  to  the  adoption 
of  measures  tending  to  the  sudden  reduction,  at  any  cost  to  the 
people,  of  gold  to  par  ?  Such  measures  are,  as  we  all  know,  now 
advocated  in  some  of  the  most  influential  Republican  journals,  and 
they  have,  as  I  have  good  reason  to  believe,  received  the  approba- 
tion of  men  of  the  highest  standing  connected  with  the  Administra- 
tion. That  they  would  be  suicidal  in  their  tendency  cannot  be  re- 
ceived as  furnishing  even  the  slightest  evidence  that  they  will  not  be 
adopted,  seeing  that  we  have  now  before  us  evidence  that  gentlemen 
connected  with  railroads  have  so  entirely  failed  to  profit  by  ex- 
perience which  should  have  taught  them  that  the  cheap  British  iron 
of  1864  was  but  the  trap  by  help  of  which  they  were  to  be  made  to 
pay  probably  twice  the  price  for  just  such  iron,  poor  as  it  generally 
is,  in  1866.  Time  and  again  have  they  and  their  predecessors  been 
brayed  in  the  British  "  mortar,"  yet  has  their  "  foolishness"  not  yet 
departed  from  them. 

The  direct  contribution  of  pig  and  bar  iron  to  the  revenue  can 
scarcely  this  year  be  taken,  as  I  think,  at  less  than  $5,000,000.  Add 
to  this  the  taxes  on  coal,  lime,  transportation,  incomes,  &c.  &c.  &c., 
and  we  shall  obtain  probably  double  that  amount.  This  woud 


23 

seem  to  be  a  large  sum  to  put  at  risk,  and  yet  it  is  as  nothing  com- 
pared with  the  extent  of  risk  that  is  to  be  incurred,  the  coal  and  iron 
trades  of  the  country  constituting  the  foundation  upon  which  this 
day  rests  our  whole  system  of  internal  revenue.  Break  them  down, 
as  they  will  be  broken  if  the  system  be  not  promptly  changed, 
and  the  Government  will,  before  the  lapse  of  even  a  single  year, 
become  so  utterly  bankrupt  that  its  certificates  of  indebtedness  will 
have  little  more  value  in  the  public  eye  than  have  this  day  those 
of  the  so-called  Confederacy  of  the  Southern  States. 

To  those  who  may  entertain  any  doubts  on  this  subject  I  would 
recommend  reflection  on  the  following  facts  : — 

I.  The  consumption  of  iron  is  the  test  of  growing  civilization, 
strength,  and  power. 

II.  That  consumption  doubled  in  the  protective  period  from  1828 
to  1834,  our  numbers  meanwhile  increasing  but  20  per  cent. 

III.  Eight  years  later,  in  1842,  with  British  free  trade  and  an 
increase  of  numbers  amounting  to  30  per  cent.,  the  quantity  con- 
sumed had  made  scarcely  any  progress  whatsoever. 

III.  Thence  to  1848,  under  protection,  with  a  growth  of  popu- 
lation of  but  20  per  cent,  it  trebled — having  already  reached  the 
large  amount  of  900,000  tons. 

IV.  Twelve  years  now  follow,  spent  under  the  British  free  trade 
system,  giving  us — an  increase  of  population  to  the  extent  of  nearly 
40  per  cent. — the  great  discovery  o/  California  gold  with  correspond- 
ing increase  in  the  necessity  for  internal  intercourse — and  ao  increase 
in  the  consumption  scarcely,  if  at  all,  exceeding  12  per  cent. 

Y.  In  the  three  years  that  have  now  elapsed  since  the  Morrill 
tariff  became  fairly  operative,  the  population  subject  to  it  has  been 
less  by  a  third  than  that  of  1860,  and  yet  the  consumption  now 
exceeds  1,300,000  tons,  having  increased  more  than  30  per  cent. 

In  the  first  and  third  of  these  periods  every  branch  of  manufacture 
was  prosperous,  and  the  power  of  the  people,  at  their  close,  to  con- 
tribute to  the  support  of  Government  was  thrice  greater  than  it  had 
been  at  their  commencement. 

In  the  second  and  fourth  every  branch  of  manufacture  was  pros- 
trate, and  the  power  at  their  close  to  contribute  to  the  support  of 
Government  had  been  almost  entirely  annihilated. 

In  the  fifth  there  has  been  an  activity  of  commerce  that  before 
had  not  been  paralleled,  as  a  consequence  of  which  our  people  have 
been  enabled  to  contribute  to  the  support  of  Government  hundreds 


24 

of  millions,  and  with  far  more  ease  than  in  1860  they  could  have 
furnished  tens  of  millions.  Our  whole  experience  proves,  then,  that 
power  for  maintaining  the  Government  grows  or  declines  almost 
geometrically  as  the  consumption  of  iron  increases  or  decreases 
arithmetically. 

Having  reflected  on  the  facts  thus  presented,  I  would  now,  my 
dear  sir,  beg  you  tQ  answer  to  yourself  if  our  iron  consumers,  in 
the  course  they  have  recently  adopted,  have  not  furnished  proof 
conclusive  that  they  are  of  the  same  race  precisely  with  the  Bour- 
bons, of  whom  it  was  said  on  their  return  to  France  on  the  down- 
fall of  Napoleon,  that  they  had  not  profited  by  their  long  experience 
of  the  troubles  of  exile  to  learn  anything  they  had  not  previously 
known,  or  to  forget  any  of  the  prejudices  with  which  they  had 
started.  Both  alike  had  been  "  brayed  in  the  mortar"  of  experience, 
yet  had  they  remained  as  "  foolish"  as  at  first. 

Such  having  been  the  course  pursued  in  regard  to  this  great 
fundamental  branch  of  manufacture,  let  us  now  look  to  that  pre- 
sented in  reference  to  another  and  very  subordinate  branch  that  has 
just  now  been  brought  into  discussion — that  of  spool  cotton.  By 
the  tariff  of  1861,  the  duty  thereon  was  fixed  at  24  per  cent.  By 
that  of  1862  it  was  raised  to  30  per  cent.  That  of  1863  made  it 
40.  Again  raised  in  1864,  we  find  it  to  be  a  combination  of  spe- 
cific and  ad-valorem  duties  that  compels  the  foreign  producer  to  pay 
more  than  four  times  as  much  in  gold  as  is  paid  by  the  domestic 
one  in  paper.  The  domestic  iron  producer,  on  the  contrary,  pays 
nearly  as  much  in  paper  as  the  foreign  one  pays  in  gold.  The 
domestic  paper  producer  pays  more  than  half  as  much  in  paper  as 
the  foreign  manufacturer  pays  in  gold,  the  great  fundamental  indus- 
tries being  thus  almost  entirely  abandoned  to  the  "tender  mercies" 
of  "  wealthy  English  capitalists,"  while  the  minor  ones  are  placed 
in  a  condition  to  feel  themselves  entirely  secure. 

The  "  absurdity"  of  all  this  is  most  remarkable,  the  market  for 
thread,  cloth,  books,  and  all  other  commodities  being  almost  wholly 
dependent  upon  the  prosperity  of  the  great  coal,  iron,  and  paper 
producing  interests.  Such  legislation  would  find  its  fittest  legislator 
in  the  man  who  should  spend  his  mornings  in  carefully  trimming 
the  branches  of  his  trees  while  his  evenings  were  as  assiduously 
employed  in  cutting  away  their  roots. 

To  what  cause  is  such  "absurdity"  to  be  attributed  ?  In  great 
part  to  the  existence  of  that  powerful  British  combination  so  well 
described  in  the  Report  to  Parliament  heretofore  given,  and  in  no 


25 

inconsiderable  part  to  a  necessity  that  was,  at  the  date  of  the  Con- 
gressional action  above  described,  supposed  to  exist  for  "punishing 
Pennsylvania."  Almost  inconceivable  as  it  may  seem  that  such 
should  be  the  grounds  on  which  was  based  the  decision  of  one  of 
the  greatest  of  national  questions,  that  it  was  so  based  there  is  not, 
as  I  believe,  the  smallest  reason  to  doubt.  Assuming  it  so  to  have 
been,  it  may  not  be,  my  dear  sir,  improper  here  to  ask  your  atten- 
tion to  a  few  facts  in  relation  to  the  past  and  present  of  the  great 
State  which  then  was  held  to  stand  so  much  in  need  of  punishment. 

As  New  England  furnishes  us  the  type  of  that  portion,  of  our 
population  which  has  occupied  New  York,  the  northern  edge  of 
Pennsylvania,  northern  Ohio,  Indiana,  and  Illinois,  Michigan,  and 
other  Northwestern  States,  so  do  Pennsylvania  and  New  Jersey 
give  us  the  type  of  the  population  of  a  great  belt  of  territory,  120 
miles  in  breadth,  and  ten  times  that  in  length,  now  containing  more 
than  10,000,000  of  as  industrious  and  active  people  as  can  be  found 
elsewhere  throughout  the  world.  When,  therefore,  Pennsylvania 
speaks,  she  does  so  as  the  representative  of  the  opinion  of  all  those 
millions,  and  therefore  is  it — and  not  because  of  her  own  particular 
strength — that  it  has  grown  into  a  proverb,  that  as  Pennsylvania 
goes,  so  goes  the  Union. 

How  has  she  gone  in  those  two  great  crises  which,  since  the  peace 
of  1783,  most  have  "tried  men's  souls" — those  of  the  institution  in 
1788  of  the  present  government,  and  at  later  ones  of  the  past  fo'ur 
years  ?  Let  us  see. 

The  Constitution,  as  adopted  by  the  Convention  of  1788,  placed 
the  smaller  States,  as  regarded  Senatorial  representation,  on  an 
equal  footing  with  the  larger  ones,  and  hence  gave  great  offence  to 
nearly  all  of  these  latter.  The  single  exception  to  this  was  found 
in  Pennsylvania,  which,  first  of  all  to  consider  that  great  instrument, 
was  first  of  all,  with  the  single  exception  of  the  little  State  of  Dela- 
ware, to  ratify  it.  Months  elapsed  before  her  example  was  followed 
by  Massachusetts  and  Virginia,  while  something  closely  resembling 
compulsion  was  required  before  it  was  accepted  by  New  York. 

In  that  great  crisis  Pennsylvania,  by  her  remarkable  magnanimity, 
earned  the  title  of  the  Keystone  State,  but  whether  or  not  it  was 
then  that  it  was  given  to  her,  I  have  no  means  of  knowing.  Cer- 
tain it  is,  that  but  for  her  prompt  and  decided  action  the  Union,  as 
it  since  has  been,  would  never  have  been  accomplished. 

Coming  now  to  the  second  great  crisis,  that  in  which  we  are  now 


26 

involved,  let  us  see  how  she  has  gone,  and  how  fnr  her  action  has 
tended  to  maintain  that  Union  which  had  been  indebted  to  her  for 
all  its  previous  existence. 

I.  Scarcely  had  the  first  call  of  the  President  been  fully  met  before 
she  applied  herself  diligently  to  the  creation  of  a  large  and  fully 
appointed  army,  whose  acceptance  was  urged  upon  the  Government. 
Had  it  been  accepted,  the  Bull  Run  battle  would  probably  have  had 
a  very  different  termination.     Had  it  not  existed,  the  war  might, 
and  probably  would,  then  have  ended  in  the  capture  of  Washington. 

II.  In  three  years  and  a  half  she  has  furnished  to  the  army, 
exclusive  of  militia  and  ninety  days  volunteers,  above  300,000  men, 
or  more  than  a  tithe  of  her  whole  population.     Had  all  the  loyal 
States  done  as  much,  the  whole  number  supplied  by  them  would 
have  exceeded  2,000,000.  ,  Always  among  the  first,  even  when  not 
actually  first  in  point  of  time,  she  has  never  been  behind  any  in 
point  of  numbers. 

III.  Always  ready  in  the  field,  she  has  been  equally  so  at  the 
polls.     When  New  York  had  abandoned  the  national  cause,  and 
when  the  whole  future  of  the  country  had  become  dependent  upon 
the  question  whether  she  would,  or  would  not,  place  herself  side  by 
side  with  that  State  and  New  Jersey  and  thus  cripple  the  Federal 
Government,  she  gave  in  her  adhesion  to  the  great  cause,  and  by  a 
majority  that,  allowing  for  the  absent  troops,  was  greater  than  it 
had  been  at  the  first.     Had  she  acted  differently  on  that  occasion, 
the  war  must  have  come  to  an  end,  and  the  Union  must  have  ceased 
to  exist.     From  first  to  last,  therefore,  she  has  proved  herself  to  be 
the  Keystone  State. 

IV.  In  her  Commercial  Capital,  she  has  given  the  most  loyal 
city  of  the  Union ;  the  one  that  has,  in  proportion  to  its  means, 
furnished  the  largest  contributions;  that  one  which  alone  has  fed 
the  tired  and  hungry  soldier,  from  whatsoever  State  he  has  hailed ; 
and  that  one  towards  which  the  cold  shoulder  of  the  Government 
has  invariably  been  turned. 

Such  having  been  the  course  which  has  so  recently  subjected  her 
to  "punishment,"  we  may  now,  my  dear  sir,  without  impropriety, 
look  for  a  moment  to  the  machinery  by  means  of  which  it  has  been 
administered.  As  it  was  at  the  time  explained  to  me,  it  was  as 
follows :  Leader  in  the  action  was  a  British  agent,  representative 
of  those  "wealthy  English  capitalists,"  who  furnish  "great  instru- 
ments of  warfare  against  the  competing  capital  of  other  countries," 


27 

by  means  of  which  they  "gain  and  keep  possession  of  foreign 
markets."  Iron  being  abundant  and  cheap  in  England,  a  consider- 
able quantity  had  been  shipped  to  him,  and  he  was  naturally  anxious 
to  economize  the  contribution  to  be  paid  thereon  to  the  Federal 
Government — that  one  for  whose  destruction  his  masters  were  then 
so  anxiously  laboring.  As  it  chanced,  some  little  Western  roads 
stood  in  pressing  need  of  iron,  and  money  was  then  so  scarce  with 
them  that  the  saving  of  a  few  thousand  dollars  thereon  was  deemed 
a  matter  of  much  importance.  For  accomplishing  that  saving  it 
was  needed  that  they  should  obtain  a  change  in  the  tariff  law. 
Forthwith,  they  and  their  English  friends  set  themselves  to  prove 
that  the  wear  and  tear  of  roads  was  twice  as  great  as  it  really  had 
been,  the  producing  power  of  American  mills  being  at  the  same  time 
proved  to  be  less  than  half  of  what  we  know  to  be  its  actual  amount. 
Other  roads,  the  managers  of  which  were  thus  deceived,  were  led  to 
lend  their  aid.  To  these  were  now  to  be  added  all  of  the  men  in 
Congress  who  desired  to  see  the  Government  reduced  to  bankruptcy, 
and  thus  was  formed  a  "  ring"  of  size  sufficient  to  "  punish  Penn- 
sylvania." The  deed  was  done,  and  thus  was  at  once  destroyed 
all  confidence  in  the  permanence  of  a  system  that  had  been  received 
by  the  world  as  confirmation  by  Congress  of  that  remarkable  ex- 
pression of  the  public  will  given  at  the  Convention  held  in  Chi- 
cago five  years  since.  For  its  destruction  there  was  given,  as  I 
believe,  the  vote  of  nearly  every  man  who  has  on  all  occasions 
opposed  the  Government  in  its  efforts  to  maintain  the  national 
credit,  they  well  knowing,  as  I  doubt  not,  that  in  crippling  the  iron 
manufacture,  and  in  punishing  its  chief  representative,  they  were 
rendering  the  largest  service  in  their  power  to  the  rebellious  States. 

That  this  is  a  correct  statement  of  the  means  by  which  that  dis- 
creditable action  was  brought  about,  I  entertain  no  doubt.  Admit- 
ting for  the  moment  that  it  is  so,  does  it  not  present  a  state  of 
things  of  which  we  have  reason  to  feel  much  ashamed  ?  In  what 
other  nation,  making  any  claim  to  civilization,  are  miserable  foreign 
emissaries  permitted  thus  to  prowl  through  the  halls  of  legislation  ? 
Were  such  things  tolerated  in  England  or  in  France,  should  we 
hold  those  nations  in  much  respect  ?  Could  they  respect  them- 
selves? Can  we  claim  the  existence  of  anything  like  self-respect 
while  such  profligate  and  impertinent  meddling  with  our  affairs  shall 
continue  to  be  tolerated  ?  As  it  appears  to  me,  we  certainly  cannot. 

Having  shown  the  past  of  the  great  State  which  has  thus,  and  at 


the  hands  of  a  wretched  foreign  broker,  received  the  "punishment" 
she  had  so  well  earned,  I  desire  now  to  ask  you  to  look  for  a 
moment  at  her  present,  with  a  view  to  the  determination  of  the 
question  what  should  be  her  action  in  the  future. 

Four  years  since,  she  and  Virginia  presented  the  types  of  two 
great  sections  of  the  Union,  the  one  north,  and  the  other  south, 
of  Mason  and  Dixon's  line,  the  Ohio  and  the  Missouri.  On  one 
side  was  the  freedom  which  always  accompanies  the  connection  of 
agriculture  with  manufactures.  On  the  other  was  the  slavery  which 
always  accompanies  that  exclusive  devotion  of  labor  to  the  work 
of  supplying  distant  markets  which  Britain  and  Carolina  have 
always  sought  to  perpetuate.  On  both  sides  there  existed  a  belief 
in  the  necessity  for  measures  of  protection,  except  in  the  single,  and 
then  dominant,  State  of  Virginia.  Since  then,  however,  she  has 
abdicated,  and  freedom  has  taken,  or  is  now  rapidly,  taking,  the 
place  of  slavery  throughout  the  whole  of  that  region  of  country,  the 
richest  in  the  world  in  regard  to  metals  of  almost  every  kind.  Her 
abdication  has  placed  the  punished  Pennsylvania  now  in  the  lead  of 
all  the  Mining  States,  embracing  a  territory  of  600,000  square  miles, 
throughout  which  coal,  ii'on,  lead,  copper,  gold,  and  other  metals  so 
much  abound  that  labor  alone  is  needed  for  carrying  up,  within  the 
next  twenty  years,  their  production  to  an  extent  far  greater  than 
the  present  consumption  of  the  entire  world.  To  the  development 
of  that  wealth  we  have  to  look  if  we  would  sustain  the  Government 
and  maintain  the  Union.  To  it  must  we  look  if  we  would  maintain 
our  credit  and  pay  our  debts.  To  it  alone  can  we  look  if  we  would 
sink  so  deeply  the  foundations  of  our  great  public  edifice  as  ±o  secure 
for  it  that  stability  of  action  which  is  needed  to  give  it  permanence. 
Upon  this,  however,  through  one  of  her  little  deputies,  Britain 
has  put  her  veto,  thereby  punishing  Pennsylvania  for  making  the 
attempt. 

What  now  should  the  latter  do  ?  Should  she  sit  still  while  the 
foundations  of  our  system  are  being  undermined  ?  Should  she 
tolerate  a  policy  thus  forced  upon  the  nation  by  foreign  agents,  that 
must  end  in  her  own  ruin,  and  that  of  her  sister  States  ?  Should 
she  longer  tolerate  the  impertinent  interference  of  British  brokers  in 
affairs  of  such  high  importance  ?  That  she  should  not,  I  feel  well 
assured.  What  then  should  she  do  ? 

She  ought  to  invite  a  Convention,  representing  the  people  of  all 
the  Mining  States,  in  population  comprising  probably  three-fifths  of 


29 

the  whole  Union,  and  in  national  resources,  three-fourths,  with  a  view 
to  that  combination  of  effort  which  is  needed  for  enabling  us  to  free 
the  country  from,  this  foreign  dictation.  She  should  proclaim  her 
intention  to  seek,  by  all  constitutional  means,  to  make  of  the  De- 
claration of  Independence  something  of  more  value  than  would  be 
an  equal  quantity  of  mere  blank  paper.  She  should  say  to  the 
people  of  the  whole  of  those  States,  that  she  desired  to  secure  for 
herself  and  them  that  protection  which  would  enable  them  to  unite 
in  supplying  the  world,  both  abroad  and  at  home,  with  iron,  confi- 
dently relying  upon  a  growth  of  demand  that  would  keep  pace  with 
growth  of  supply,  and  thus  furnish  evidence  of  increasing  strength 
and  advancing  civilization.  To  the  people  outside  of  the  Mining 
States  she  should  say,  that  the  more  iron  made  at  home  the  greater 
would  be  the  demand  for  cotton  and  sugar,  and  for  cotton  and 
woollen  goods ;  that  among  the  various  portions  of  the  country 
there  was  a  perfect  harmony  of  interests ;  that  in  her  efforts  at 
stimulating  into  activity  the  great  resources  of  the  centre,  she  was 
giving  her  energies  towards  securing  happiness  and  prosperity  to 
the  people  of  the  north,  south,  east,  and  west ;  and,  that  in  thus 
presenting  a  mode  of  outdoing  England  without  fighting  her,  she 
was  doing  that  which  was  required  for  enabling  all  to  enjoy  in 
peace  the  grand  results  which  must  be  obtained  from  the  suppression 
of  the  great  rebellion. 

Twice  already  in  great  crises  has  she  proved  her  claim  to  her 
title  of  Keystone  State.  Let  her  do  so  once  again  ;  let  her  now 
do  what  it  is  clearly  in  her  power  to  do,  for  giving  practical  effect 
to  the  Declaration  of  Independence ;  let  her  show  to  the  world  that 
power,  wealth,  credit,  prosperity,  and  happiness,  may  be  procured 
by  means  of  peaceful  measures  that  shall  at  the  same  time  give  us 
satisfaction  for  all  past  injuries  received  from  abroad ;  and  she 
will  thereby  earn  the  thanks  of  every  American,  every  friend  of  peace, 
every  lover  of  his  kind,  every  Christian  throughout  the  world. 

Having  thus  shown  what  is,  as  I  think,  the  duty  of  what  is  now 
the  leading  iron-producing  State,  I  propose,  in  another  letter,  to 
show  what  it  is  that  I  deem  to  be  the  duty  of  the  iron  producers, 
and  meanwhile  remain,  with  great  regard  and  respect, 

Yours,  very  truly, 

HENRY  C.  CAREY. 

Hon.  SCHUYLER  COLFAX. 
PHILADELPHIA,  January  11,  1865. 


THE  IRON  QUESTION. 


LETTER   EIGHTH. 

DEAR  SIR  : — 

For  every  ton  of  railroad  bars  now  made  here,  the  maker  is  re- 
quired to  contribute  for  the  support  of  the  war  and  for  maintenance 
of  the  public  credit,  at  least  ten  dollars.  For  every  ton  of  British 
bars  imported  the  manufacturer  is  required  to  contribute  for  the 
same  purposes,  the  sum  of  twelve  dollars.  For  every  ton  of  the 
first  transported,  the  producer  is  required  to  pay  into  the  treasuries 
of  American  railroad  companies,  and  to  the  owners  of  American 
vessels — both  large  contributors  to  the  Public  Revenue — a  sum 
that  is,  probably,  on  an  average,  little  less  than  twice  as  great  as 
are  the  freights  from  abroad  of  that  British  iron  which  comes  in 
British  ships,  owned  by  the  men  who  are  now  using  their  best  eiforts 
in  the  advocacy,  and  in  the  material  support,  of  the  rebellion.*  Their 
vessels  pay  nothing  in  the  shape  of  tonnage  duties,  nothing  for  the 
use  of  lights  that  are  maintained  by  us  at  heavy  cost.  Their 
owners  pay  no  excise  duties  on  their  iron.  They  have  their  coal  free 
of  duty,  and  at  a  third  of  the  cost  of  that  used  by  our  ships.  They 
are  free  from  the  thousand  claims  upon  their  means  which  now  com- 
pel our  people  to  such  high  charges  as  have  almost  driven  from  the 
ocean  the  Stars  and  Stripes.  Those  charges  must  continue  if  we 
would  maintain  the  Public  Revenue,  and  they  must  become  from 
year  to  year  more  burthensome  if  we  shall,  by  any  error  of  legisla- 
tion, diminish  the  power  of  any  great  branch  of  manufacture  to 
contribute  to  that  revenue. 

Taking  into  view,  then,  the  direct  and  indirect  contributions  of  a 
ton  of  American  bars,  and  placing  them  side  by  side  with  a  ton  of 
those  made  in  Britain,  the  producer  of  the  former  has  not  alone  been 

*  I  have  now  before  me  the  transportation  account  of  an  establishment 
within  thirty  miles  of  tide-water,  and  otherwise  favorably  situated,  from 
which  it  appears  that  the  actual  railroad  charge  for  carriage  of  materials 
and  iron  was,  last  year,  $13  40  per  ton. 


31 

reduced  to  an  equality  with  the  latter,  but  to  even  a  worse  position, 
the  British  producer  being  now,  in  effect,  protected  against  the 
American  one,  whereas,  even  under  the  British  free  trade  tariff  of 
1846,  the  mere  revenue  duty  gave  the  latter  some  slight  protection 
against  the  former. 

In  opposition  to  this  it  will,  however,  be  said,  that  British  rails 
cannot  now  be  imported  without  loss.  That  is  true  to-day,  because 
the  premium  on  gold  still  remains  as  a  slight  protection.  To  whom, 
however,  are  the  iron  producers  indebted  for  it  ?  Is  it  to  the  iron 
consumers  ?  Is  it  to  that  greatest  of  all  consumers,  the  Government 
— that  one  which  has  just  decided  that  to  that  premium,  alone  the 
producer  shall  look  in  all  the  future  for  protection  against  those 
"  wealthy  English  capitalists,"  by  whom  they  have  so  frequently  been 
crushed  ?  It  is  not ;  so  directly  the  reverse  of  this  is  it,  that  every 
branch  of  that  Government  is  now  striving  to  put  down  the  price 
of  gold,  and  thus  to  deprive  that  greatest  of  all  our  manufactures 
of  the  little  protection  that  has  been  left.  But  recently,  as  there 
is  the  best  reason  for  believing,  a  proposition  has  been  made  to  it 
on  the  part  of  these  "  wealthy  capitalists,"  having  specially  in  view 
a  great  reduction  in  the  price  of  gold  ;  such  a  reduction  as  will,  if 
it  shall  be  carried  into  effect,  place  the  whole  iron  manufacture,  and 
many  other  departments  of  our  now  so  greatly  varied  industry,  en- 
tirely at  the  mercy  of  the  men  who  "voluntarily  incur  immense 
losses  in  order  to  destroy  foreign  competition,  and  to  gain  and  keep 
possession  of  foreign  markets."  Whether  or  not  that  particular 
proposition,  or  any  other  looking  in  that  direction,  will  be  accepted, 
no  one  can  now  venture  to  predict ;  but  it  requires  little  of  the  spirit 
of  prophecy  to  venture  on  the  prediction  that  if,  in  the  present  state 
of  our  tariff  legislation,  any  one  at  all  like  it  shall  be  accepted,  it 
will  bring  with  it  such  reduction  of  the  Internal  Revenue  as  must 
result  in  bankruptcy  of  the  Government,  to  be  followed  by  Revolu- 
tion. 

From  that  Government  the  iron  producer  has  now,  practically, 
no  protection  whatsoever.  Does  he,  then,  owe  to  it,  in  its  character 
of  iron  consumer,  the  performance  of  any  act  of  duty  ?  As  it  seems 
to  me,  he  does  not.  Even  in  feudal  times  protection  and  service 
went  hand  in  hand  together,  the  right  to  demand  the  latter  ceasing 
with  the  power  to  afford  the  former.  Admitting,  then,  the  facts  to 
be  as  I  have  stated  them,  are  not  the  iron  producers  now  free  for 
the  adoption  of  whatsoever  measures  they  may  see  to  be  required 


32 

for  self -protection  ?  That  they  are  so,  I  fully  believe.  Still  further 
do  I  believe,  that  as  men  who  desire  to  protect  the  public  revenue, 
maintain  the  public  credit,  and  restore  the  country  to  a  condition  of 
peace  and  union,  and  as  citizens  anxious  to  free  it  from  the  control 
of  foreign  agitators  who  are  in  every  manner  seeking  the  accom- 
plishment of  disunion,  it  is  their  duty  to  combine  together  in  oppo- 
sition to  the  present  combination  for  our  subjection,  and  for  the 
re-establishment  of  a  state  of  colonial  dependence  that,  should  the 
present  effort  prove  successful,  will  be  more  complete  than  it  has 
been  at  any  period  since  the  Peace  of  1783. 

So  regarding  the  question  that  is  now  to  be  settled,  it  is  my  belief 
that  a  sense  of  duty  should  prompt  the  iron  producers  to  address  its 
consumers  in  the  following  terms  : — 

GENTLEMEN  : — 

Forty  years  since,  notwithstanding  our  wonderful  superabundance 
of  fuel  and  of  ore,  the  iron  manufacture  had  among  us  scarcely  an 
existence.  The  largest  furnace  in  the  Union  could  not  produce  1500 
tons  a  year,  and  the  total  product  of  pig  metal  was  under  50,000. 
In  1828,  now  but  36  years  since,  there  was  passed  the  first  Tariff 
Act  based  on  the  idea  that  the  producers  and  consumers  of  food, 
cloth,  and  iron  constituted  one  great  family,  all  of  whose  interests  were 
in  perfect  harmony,  each  with  every  other.  To  enable  the  food  pro- 
ducer readily  to  obtain  iron,  he  must  have  the  miner  brought  near 
to  him,  thus  to  give  value  to  the  coal  and  the  iron  lying  beneath 
his  land.  To  enable  the  producer  of  iron  to  obtain  cloth,  it  was 
deemed  necessary  that  the  spinner  and  the  weaver  should  be  brought 
from  abroad  to  eat  the  food  while  spinning  and  weaving  the  wool. 
To  enable  the  ship  owner  to  obtain  large  return  freights,  it  was 
deemed  necessary  to  secure  to  the  immigrant  certain  and  well-re- 
warded employment.  To  enable  the  proprietor  to  sell  his  land,  it 
was  deemed  necessary  to  bring  the  market  to  his  door,  and  thus 
relieve  him  from  the  oppressive  tax  of  transportation  to  which  he 
had  been  so  long  subjected  by  the  British  system.  By  that  tariff 
all  those  things  were  provided  for,  the  entire  harmony  of  all  real 
and  permanent  interests  being  thus  established.  The  result  ex- 
hibited itself  in  the  facts,  that  before  the  lapse  of  a  time  equal  to 
that  of  a  single  presidential  term  the  consumption  of  cotton  and 
woollen  goods  had  nearly  doubled,  that  of  iron  nearly  trebled,  while 
that  of  coal  had  almost  tenfold  increased.  As  a  consequence  of 


33 

this  there  was  large  consumption  of  tea,  coffee,  sugar,  and  other 
foreign  commodities,  the  public  revenue  was  great,  the  national 
treasury  was  full,  and  the  public  debt  was  in  rapid  progress  to- 
wards that  entire  extinction  which  occurred  in  the  following  presi- 
dential term. 

The  great  improvement  in  the  condition  of  our  people  which  thus 
was  proved,  found  its  base  in  the  great  development  of  the  mineral 
resources  of  the  country.  Without  power  machinery  could  not  be 
driven,  nor  without  machinery  could  cloth  be  made.  As  a  means 
of  securing  that  development,  the  consumers  of  iron  had  pledged 
themselves  to  protect  its  producers  against  a  foreign  combination 
whose  modes  of  operation  are  well  described  in  a  Report  to  Parlia- 
ment, made  but  a  few  years  since,  from  which  the  following  is  an 
extract : — 

"The  laboring  classes  generally,  in  the  manufacturing  districts  of 
this  country  and  especially  in  the  iron  and  coal  districts,  are  very 
little  aware  of  the  extent  to  which  they  are  often  indebted  for  their 
being  employed  at  all  to  the  immense  losses  which  their  employers 
voluntarily  incur  in  bad  times,  in  order  to  destroy  foreign  competi- 
tion, and  to  gain  and  keep  possession  of  foreign  markets.  Au- 
thentic instances  are  well  known  of  employers  having  in  such  times 
carried  on  their  works  at  a  loss  amounting  in  the  aggregate  to 
three  or  four  hundred  thousand  pounds  in  the  course  of  three  or 
four  years.  If  the  efforts  of  those  who  encourage  the  combinations 
to  restrict  the  amount  of  labor  and  to  produce  strikes  |jere  to  be 
successful  for  any  length  of  time,  the  great  accumulations  of  capital 
could  no  longer  be  made  which  enable  a  few  of  the  most  wealthy 
capitalists  to  overwhelm  all  foreign  competition  in  times  of  great 
depression,  and  thus  to  clear  the  way  for  the  whole  trade  to  step 
in  when  prices  revive,  and  to  carry  on  a  great  business  beforeybmgrn 
capital  can  again  accumulate  to  such  an  extent  as  to  be  able  to 
establish  a  competition  in  prices  with  any  chance  of  success.  The 
large  capitals  of  this  country  are  the  great  instruments  of  warfare 
against  the  competing  capital  of  foreign  countries,  and  are  the  most 
essential  instruments  now  remaining  by  which  our  manufacturing 
supremacy  can  be  maintained ;  the  other  elements — cheap  labor, 
abundance  of  raw  material,  means  of  communication,  and  skilled 
labor — being  rapidly  in  process  of  being  equalized." 

That  pledge  having  been  accepted,  large  amounts  of  capital  had 
been  applied  to  the  opening  of  mines,  the  building  of  furnacos  and 
mills,  and  the  construction  of  the  roads  and  canals  required  for 
carrying  their  products  to  market,  thereby  laying  the  foundation  of 
a  coal  and  iron  trade  that,  had  it  been  permitted  to  obtain  develop- 


34 

ment,  would  long  since  have  placed  the  country  in  a  position  to 
become  the  great  exporter  of  iron  and  of  machinery,  and  thus  to 
take  the  place  that  till  then  had  been  occupied  by  England.  That 
pledge  however,  unfortunately  for  the  country,  was  not  redeemed. 
Then,  as  always  before,  agitation  in  and  out  of  Congress  was 
resorted  to  for  the  purpose  of  striking  down  this  great  and  funda- 
mental industry,  and  thus  relieving  the  "  wealthy  English  capi- 
talists" from  all  danger  of  future  interference.  As  a  consequence 
of  this  railroad  bars  were  made  free  of  duty  in  1832,  and  thus  were 
furnaces  deprived  of  the  great  market  opening  in  that  direction  for 
their  products.  Next,  and  in  the  following  year,  the  whole  tariff 
was  subjected  to  a  process  by  means  of  which  iron  and  all  the 
manufactures  in  which  it  was  required  were  speedily  to  be  deprived 
of  all  protection.  Confidence  in  the  future  now  wholly  passed 
away.  Mills  and  furnaces  ceased  to  be  built.  Financial  crises  fol- 
lowed closely  one  upon  another,  with  the  necessary  result  of  almost 
annihilating  the  value  of  the  vast  capital,  counting  by  tens  of  mil- 
lions, that  had  been  applied  to  the  development  of  the  two  great 
industries  upon  which  then  depended  the  whole  future  of  the  Union. 
It  was  a  destruction  of  property  till  then  without  a  parallel  in 
history,  to  have  been  accomplished  by  the  act  of  the  very  people 
who  were  destined  most  to  suffer  under  it — the  producers  of  food  and 
the  consumers  of  iron.  The  one  lost  his  market  among  the  men 
who  mined  the  coal  and  ore  and  made  the  iron,  and  the  other  found 
that  the  impoverished  farmer  was  unable  to  buy  cloth.  In  crushing 
out  these  two  great  industries  the  iron  consumers,  your  predecessors, 
had,  Samson  like,  torn  down  the  pillars  of  the  Temple,  and  had 
involved  themselves  and  their  Governments,  Municipal,  State,  and 
Federal,  in  one  common  ruin.  Railroads,  constructed  by  aid  of 
cheap  and  worthless  British  iron  made  from  a  long  accumulation 
of  cinder,  fell  so  much  in  value  that  their  proprietors  were  unable  to 
sell  their  shares  at  any  price.  Workshops  were  closed,  and  work- 
men were  everywhere  reduced  to  ask  for  alms.  Spinners  and  weavers 
shared  the  same  sad  fate  with  the  miner  and  the  founder.  The 
trader,  unable  to  collect  the  moneys  due  him,  was  unable  to  pay  the 
bank,  and  the  banker  followed  him  in  stopping  payment  of  his  debts. 
The  National  Treasury,  reduced  to  bankruptcy,  was  unable  to  borrow, 
on  any  terms,  the  amount  required  to  make  amends  for  the  deficiency 
thus  produced  in  its  then  trivial  revenue.  Chaos  had  come  again — 
the  same  chaotic  state  of  things  that  had  preceded  the  passage  of 


35 

the  Protective  Act  of  1824.  It  had  come,  too,  as  a  consequence  of 
the  inauguration  of  a  government  of  foreign  traders  who  sought 
monopoly,  and  talked  of  freedom  of  trade.  How  free  it  was,  has 
been  shown  in  the  passage  from  the  Parliamentary  Report  we  have 
above  submitted  to  your  consideration.  How  profitable  it  had  been, 
was  proved  by  the  fact,  that,  notwithstanding  an  increase  of  one- 
fourth  in  population,  the  consumption  of  iron  had  scarcely  at  all 
increased. 

For  all  this  a  remedy  needed  to  be  found.  It  came  in  the  form 
of  the  tariff  of  1842,  by  which  the  American  people  once  again 
pledged  themselves  to  the  capitalist,  that  if  he  would  apply  his 
means  to  the  development  of  those  great  mineral  resources  of  the 
country  which  constituted  the  foundation  upon  which,  alone,  could 
rest  securely  our  social  edifice,  he  should  be  protected  against  those 
"  wealthy  capitalists"  who  had  so  long  been  accustomed  to  regard 
temporary  losses  as  merely  a  mode  of  employing  their  great  "  in- 
strument of  warfare"  in  the  manner  most  efficient  for  the  accom- 
plishing of  the  one  great  purpose,  that  of  "  destroying  foreign  com- 
petition and  gaining  and  keeping  possession  of  foreign  markets." 
The  pledge  thus  tendered  was  accepted,  and  in  a  period  brief  almost 
beyond  belief  mines  were  opened,  roads  were  constructed,  and  fur- 
naces and  mills  were  built,  capable  of  supplying  a  consumption 
thrice  as  great  as  had  been  that  of  1842.  With  that  increase  in 
quantity  came  such  improvements  and  economies  in  the  mode  of 
manufacture  as  rendered  it  absolutely  certain  that,  if  faith  should 
be  kept  with  the  men  who  had  thus  given  time,  mind,  and  means 
to  the  most  important  of  all  manufactures,  but  a  brief  period 
would  be  required  to  elapse  before  they  should  be  enabled  to  supply 
the  outside  world  with  iron,  and  thus  to  furnish  new  evidence  that 
protection  was  the  road  that  led  most  certainly  in  the  direction  of 
perfect  freedom  of  trade.  At  no  period  in  our  history  had  the  de- 
mand for  labor  been  so  great.  At  none  had  there  been  even  an  ap- 
proach to  the  number  of  immigrants  who  then  sought  our  shores. 
At  none  had  property  commanded  so  large  a  price.  At  none  had 
public  and  private  credit  been  so  complete ;  and  yet,  but  five  years 
previously,  labor  had  been  everywhere  in  excess  ;  immigration,  had 
tended  to  die  away ;  property  had  been  wholly  unsaleable ;  bank- 
ruptcy had  been  almost  universal ;  and  the  public  treasury  had 
found  itself  wholly  unable  to  command  the  means  required  for  com- 
pliance with  its  engagements. 


36 

As  before,  however,  the  public  faith  was  violated,  and  because  of 
agitation  caused  by  British  agents.  Almost  without  notice  the  pledge 
given  in  1842  was  withdrawn  in  1846,  and  the  men  who  in  full 
reliance  upon  it  had  applied  their  millions  and  tens  of  millions  to 
carrying  in  effect  the  public  will  in  reference  to  the  great  work  of 
internal  development,  were  once  more  delivered  over,  bound  hand 
and  foot,  to  the  "  tender  mercies  of  the  wealthy  capitalists"  of  Eng- 
land ;  the  men  who,  while  engaged  in  the  work  of  "  overwhelming 
all  foreign  competition,"  could,  afford  to  dispense  with  interest  on 
their  capital,  their  competitors  meanwhile  paying  10,  15,  or  20  per 
cent,  per  annum  for  the  use  of  the  money  required  for  carrying 
stocks  constantly  accumulating  on  their  hands  while  engaged  in  the 
effort  at  maintaining  the  unequal  contest. 

Further  even  than  all  this,  the  Government  undertook  to  furnish 
to  the  foreign  producer  storage,  and  under  such  circumstances  as 
rendered  an  iron  certificate  of  deposit  equally  transferable  with  a 
money  one ;  whereas,  the  domestic  producer  was  by  law  deprived 
of  all  modes  of  transfer  not  accompanied  by  an  actual  delivery  of 
the  property  itself.  The  great  iron  consumer  of  the  country  had 
thus,  after  having  pledged  itself  to  the  men  who  had  bijilt  the  fur- 
naces and  rolling  mills,  opened  the  mines,  and  constructed  the  roads, 
to  protect  them  in  their  efforts  for  the  establishment  of  compe- 
tition for  the  sale  of  iron,  entered  into  an  alliance,  offensive  and 
defensive,  with  parties  whose  essential  object  was  that  of  destroying 
all  that  competition,  thereby  increasing  competition  for  the  purchase 
of  British  iron. 

Such  a  course  of  policy  could  have  but  one  result.  One  by  one 
iron  masters  succumbed  to  the  pressure.  One  by  one  the  miners  of 
coal  found  themselves  obliged  to  abandon  their  works.  Seeing  ruin 
ahead  they  begged  of  Congress  to  give  them  such  a  sliding  scale  as 
should  secure  them  $50  a  ton  for  sound  American  iron,  twice  more 
useful  than  the  worthless  trash  that  was  then  being  forced  upon  the 
markets  at  $40  by  their  British  competitors.  Trifling  as  was  this 
request  it  was  refused,  although  but  four  years  before  Mr.  Calhoun 
had  said,  that  if  he  could  be  assured  that  American  iron  masters 
could  supply  the  market  at  $80  they  should  have  any  amount  of 
protection  they  saw  fit  to  ask. 

American  production  had  now  fallen  to  little  more  than  one-half 
the  amount  at  which  it  had  stood  on  the  day  in  which  the  British 
iron  masters'  tariff,  that  of  1846,  had  gone  into  practical  effect. 


37 

Soon,  however,  came  the  influx  of  California  gold,  bringing  with 
it  a  large  demand  for  iron,  to  be  supplied,  to  a  great  extent,  by 
foreigners,  at  whose  instance  that  tariff  had  been  made,  and  now 
arose  a  competition  for  the  purchase  of  their  products  by  which 
they  largely  profited,  charging  double  price  for  all  they  furnished. 
In  three  years  they  sold  in  the  American  market  a  million  of  tons 
of  iron  in  its  various  forms,  and  at  prices  that  must  have  paid 
twenty  times  over  for  the  losses  "voluntarily  incurred"  in  the  years 
from  1848  to  1850.  A  hundred  millions  of  dollars  of  American 
property  had  been  thrown  idle,  even  where  not  destroyed,  to  enable 
foreign  iron  masters  to  tax  our  people,  in  increased  prices  alone, 
a  sum  little  short  of  that  amount.  In  the  decade  ending  June, 
1857,  there  were  imported  into  the  country  hundreds  of  millions  of 
dollars'  worth  that  would  have  been  made  at  home  but  for  the  gross 
violation,  at  its  outset,  of  pledges  voluntarily  given  by  the  ruined 
and  broken-down  iron  consumers  of  1842.  In  that  decade  there  had 
been  forced  upon  the  English  market  millions  upon  millions  of  dol- 
lars' worth  of  food  that  ought  to  have  been  consumed  at  home,  each 
successive  increase  of  export  tending  to  lessen  the  prices  of  the  great 
regulating  market  of  the  world,  and  thus  reducing,  to  the  extent  of 
thousands  of  millions  of  dollars,  the  amount  yielded  to  our  farmers 
by  their  crops.*  In  this  manner  was  built  up  the  great  foreign 
debt  that  paved  the  way  for  that  terrific  crisis  of  1857,  which  re- 
sulted in  the  stoppage  of  merchants,  the  ruin  of  manufacturers,  the 
closing  of  mills,  furnaces,  and  mines,  and  the  depletion  of  the  Na- 
tional Treasury,  and  thus  furnished  new  and  more  convincing  proof 
that  in  the  coal  and  iron  of  the  country  were  to  be  found  THE  PIL- 
LARS OF  OUR  NATIONAL  TEMPLE,  and  that  when  they  are  being 
torn  away  the  destruction  of  the  entire  edifice  is  close  at  hand. 

To  those  two  great  interests  the  whole  period  from  1856  to  1860 — 
that  which  succeeded  the  first  excitement  consequent  upon  the  dis- 

*  Every  additional  bushel  of  wheat  thrown  on  the  British  market  tends 
to  lower  the  prices  there.  Every  reduction  there  is  followed  by  a  similar 
reduction  here,  as  Liverpool  prices  regulate  those  of  New  York,  which 
regulates  Chicago.  The  reduction,  therefore,  is  felt  on  the  whole  crop.  It 
would  be  a  very  small  allowance  for  the  reduction  of  British  prices  conse- 
quent upon  American  supplies  to  put  it  at  a  shilling — 24  cents — per  bushel. 
This  upon  1250  millions  of  bushels  would  give  a  loss  to  American  farmers 
of  $300,000,000  a  year.  This  is  a  large  sum,  and  yet  it  is  short  of  the 
truth. 


38 

covery  of  California  gold — had  been  one  of  constantly  recurring 
crises,  ending  in  the  ruin  of  a  large  proportion  of  the  people  who 
had  given  time,  mind,  and  means  to  their  development.  To  the 
country  at  large  it  had  given  prostration  so  complete  that,  notwith- 
standing an  increase  of  population  to  the  extent  of  full  two-fifths, 
the  power  of  our  people  at  its  close  to  make  demand  for  iron  was 
scarcely  greater  than  it  had  been  when  the  British  iron  master's 
tariff  of  1846  first  became  instinct  with  life  and  prepared  to  exert 
its  power  for  mischief.  What  was  its  extent  shall  now  be  shown. 

Fifteen  years  before,  the  power  of  the  Alliance  between  British  free 
trade  and  slavery  which  was  now  seeking  the  perpetuation  of  the 
Colonial  System,  had  exhibited  itself  in  an  attempt  at  Nullification. 
Ten  years  later  it  had  presented  itself  in  the  form  of  an  almost 
entire  annihilation  of  our*domestic  commerce,  and  in  bankruptcy  so 
general  that  it  included  individuals  and  banks,  State  and  Federal 
Governments.  This  time  it  exhibited  itself  in  a  deliberate  attempt 
at  destruction  of  the  "Union.  Throughout  the  whole  of  the  period 
that  had  then  elapsed  since  Carolina  had  abandoned  protection  and 
readopted  that  system  which  looked  to  the  confinement  of  our  people 
to  the  raising  of  raw  products  for  distant  markets — the  system  of 
slavery  and  barbarism — Liverpool  had  been  becoming  daily  more 
and  more  the  centre  round  which  revolved  our  whole  societary 
system.  The  men  of  the  West  exchanged  with  those  of  the  East, 
and  those  of  the  South  with  those  of  the  North,  through  British 
traders — through  those  very  men  now  who  since  have  been  devot- 
ing all  their  means  and  all  their  influence  to  the  final  achievement 
of  the  one  great  end  they  so  long  had  had  in  view,  the  dissolution 
of  the  Union.  The  more  they  could  destroy  the  domestic  commerce 
the  smaller  must  become  the  threads  by  means  of  which  its  several 
sections  still  continued  to  be  held  together.  By  shutting  up  the 
mines,  furnaces,  and  mills  of  the  North  they  compelled  the  South 
to  look  to  them  for  iron,  and  the  greater  the  dependence  thus 
produced  the  higher  was  necessarily  the  cost  of  machinery,  and 
the  rate  of  interest,  at  the  North,  with  constant  increase  iu  South- 
ern dependence  on  Britain  for  a  market  for  its  cotton.  British  free 
trade  was  thus  but  the  necessary  preparation  for  that  movement  of 
I860  which  gave  us  a  war  in  the  course  of  which  rebellion  has  had 
all  the  aid,  material  and  moral,  that  British  traders  could  give  to  it. 
Fomenters  of  discord  during  the  whole  period  to  which  we  have 
referred,  they  have  now  labored  for  its  perpetuation. 


39 

That  war  had,  however,  brought  with  it  a  remedy  for  our  evils, 
for  it  had,  by  reason  of  the  secession  of  Southern  Senators,  given 
to  the  people  of  the  loyal  States  a  power  for  self-protection  of 
which  they  had  been  long  denied.  The  necessity  for  a  re-invigora- 
tion  of  the  domestic  commerce  had  now  become  so  very  evident 
that  once  more  there  was  given  to  the  men  of  capital  a  pledge  that 
if  they  would  apply  their  resources  to  the  development  of  the  great 
mineral  resources  of  the  country  they  should  now  be  certainly  pro- 
tected against  the  foreigners  by  whom  American  competition  for  the 
sale  of  iron  has  been  so  often  and  so  almost  thoroughly  destroyed. 
Past  experience  was  adverse  to  the  acceptance  of  such  a  pledge,  faith 
having  been  so  often  broken  that  confidence  in  the  national  honor 
had  well  nigh  disappeared.  Nevertheless,  it  was  accepted,  and 
forthwith  commenced  a  forward  movement  the  rapidity  of  which 
can  find  no  parallel  in  the  whole  history  of  national  development 
here  or  elsewhere.  But  three  years  have  now  elapsed  since  the 
country  first  began  to  recover  from  the  first  great  shock  of  civil 
war,  and  yet  brief  as  has  been  the  period  we  are  already  enabled  to 
show — 

I.  That  the  production  of  pig  metal  has  now  attained  an  amount 
exceeding  1,300,000   t&ns ;   and  with  so  great  a  development  of 
resources  in  regard  to  both  fuel  and  ores  that  we  are  warranted  in 
saying,  that  large  as  is  that  quantity,  it  can  be  thrice  increased  in 
the  next  four  years  : 

II.  That  there  now  exists  machinery  for  the  conversion  of  iron 
into  bars,  and  into  steel,   fully  capable  of  supplying  the  whole 
present  demand,  accompanied  with  a  power  of  increase  to  an  extent 
equal  to  any  future  demand  that  you,  consumers  of  iron,  can,  by 
any  possibility,  make : 

III.  That  the  value  of  the  product  of  the  mines,  furnaces,  and 
mills  engaged  in  furnishing  coal  and  iron  now  exceeds  two  hundred 
and  fifty  millions  of  dollars,  nearly  all  of  which  is  given  to  the 
payment  of  labor  employed  in  the  extraction  of  coal  and  ore,  in 
the  conversion  of  the  two  into  the  iron  that  you  so  greatly  need,  or 
in  the  extension  of  preparations  for  the  supply  of  both  : 

IV.  That  by  thus  making  demand  for  labor  they  are  offering 
large  bounties  for  the  importation  of  men  who  come  here  to  eat 
American  food  while  mining  coal  or  ore,  building  houses  or  ships, 
constructing   machinery   of    transportation    and    manufacture   by 
means  of  which  value  is  given  to  land,  or  farms  on  which  they 


40 

and  their  children  may  raise  the  food  required  by  other  immigrants 
who  follow  in  their  footsteps  : 

V.  That  the  market  for  food  that,  directly  or  indirectly,  is  thus 
annually  made  for  the  produce  of  the  farm,  by  these  two  great 
branches  of  industry,  is  therefore  greater  in  amount  than  was  the 
total  export  thereof  to  Europe  in  the  whole  fourteen  years  from 
the  commencement  of  vitality  in  the  British  Iron  Masters'  Tariff  of 
1846  to  the  breaking  out  of  the  rebellion  of  which  that  tariff  has 
proved  to  be  the  cause : 

VI.  That,  at  the  lowest  estimate,  the  contributions  to  the  in- 
ternal revenue,  State  and  national,  consequent  upon  the  creation  of 
this  immense  market  for  food  and  labor,  and  the  increased  value 
given  to  labor,  laud,  and  their  products,  must  be  taken  at  eighty 
millions  of  dollars ;  and — 

VII.  That,  notwithstanding  the  heavy  burthens  that  have  been 
laid  on  this  great  industry,  notwithstanding  the  extraordinary  in- 
crease in  the  price  of  labor  of  all  descriptions,  and  notwithstanding 
the  reduction  of  the  American  producer  to  a  level,  so  far  as  protec- 
tion goes,  with  his  British  competitor,  the  latter  is  even  now  so  far 
undersold  in  our  own  market  that  American  furnaces  and  rolling- 
mills  supply  the  whole  American  demand. 

That  our  duty  has  been  performed,  and  that  all  the  pledges  which 
may  have  been  given  for  us  have  been  redeemed,  are  facts  of  which 
we  thus  furnish  evidence  that  cannot  be  questioned.  Has  that  of 
the  nation  been  performed  ?  '  Has  it  kept  faith  with  us  ?  Has  it 
redeemed  the  pledge  of  protection  given  at  the  time  when,  in  the 
day  of  its  distress,  it  invited  us  to  devote  our  lives,  and  give  our 
time,  our  mind,  and  our  means  towards  the  re-establishment  of 
that  competition  with  British  iron  masters  for  the  sale  of  iron 
which,  under  the  blighting  influence  of  the  British  free  trade  tariffs 
of  1846  and  1857,  had  so  nearly  disappeared?  Let  us  inquire. 

In  March,  1861,  before  the  imposition  of  any  internal  tax  what- 
soever, the  protection  to  be  given  to  railroad  bars  was  fixed  at  $12 
per  ton,  and  it  was  then  well  understood  to  be  the  very  least  that 
could  with  propriety  be  accepted  by  the  parties  who  were  thus  to 
be  invited  to  engage  in  that  important  and  expensive  work. 

A  year  later,  heavy  taxes  having  been  imposed  on  many  articles 
used  in  manufactures  generally,  there  was  granted  to  all  of  them, 
with  the  single  exception  of  railroad  bars,  an  additional  five  per 
cent.  On  that  one:excepted  commodity,  which  now  makes  demand 


41 

for  nearly  500,000  tons  of  pig  metal,  the  increase  was  limited  to 
the  exact  amount  of  the  direct  tax,  $1  50  per  ton,  no  allowance 
having  been  made,  as  in  other  cases,  for  the  taxes  on  coal,  lime, 
or  other  materials,  nor  for  many  others,  including  that  on  incomes. 
We  have  here  the  first  violation  of  the  pledge  given  in  1861. 

At  the  last  session  of  Congress,  pig-iron  was  taxed  $2  per  ton, 
equivalent  to  nearly  $3  on  a  ton  of  bars.  The  taxes  on  coal  and 
other  materials  were  largely  increased.  That  on  railroad  iron  itself 
was  more  than  doubled.  Others  were  imposed  too  numerous  here 
to  recapitulate — the  general  result  being,  that  our  various  contribu- 
tions, consequent  upon  the  existence  of  the  war,  have  now  been 
carried  up  to  $10  per  ton.  Was  the  duty  on  foreign  iron  corre- 
spondingly increased  ?  Was  the  pledge  given  in  1861  now  re- 
deemed ?  On  the  contrary,  such  was  the  agitation  on  the  part  of 
many  of  you,  gentlemen,  consumers  of  iron,  urged  thereto  by 
British  emissaries,  that  the  duty  on  foreign  iron  was  reduced  to 
exactly  the  point  at  which  it  had  stood  when  domestic  iron  had 
been  free  from  all  such  charges.  Thus  for  the  second  time  was 
the  national  faith  violated,  and  this  time  on  so  grand  a  scale  that 
we  find  ourselves  now  placed  in  a  position,  as  compared  with  the 
foreigner,  wprse  than  was  that  we  occupied  under  the  ultra  free 
trade  tariff  of  1857.  Then,  we  had  some  slight  protection.  Now, 
the  foreigner,  as  we  shall  show,  is  protected  against  us. 

Before  doing  this  we  must,  however,  consider  the  present  transient 
protection  resulting  from  the  fact  that  the  cost  of  British  iron, 
and  the  duties  on  it,  must  be  paid  in  gold,  the  premium  thereon 
being  all  that  now  remains  to  us  as  offset  against  a  duplication, 
even  where  not  a  triplication,  of  the  cost  of  labor  and  its  products. 
No  part  of  that,  however,  do  we  hold  because  of  any  exercise  of 
power  by  Government,  from  which  we  yet  hold  the  pledge  given  in 
1861,  now  waiting  to  be  redeemed.  So  far  the  reverse  of  this  is  it, 
that  time  and  again  has  its  Finance  Minister  given  his  best  efforts 
for  the  removal  of  the  only  protection  thus  left  to  us.  Time  and 
again  has  it  listened  to  proposals  for  its  removal  coming  from 
foreigners  who  see  therein  the  only  remaining  bar  to  the  flooding 
of  our  markets  with  the  produce  of  foreign  mines,  mills,  and 
furnaces.  Time  and  again  have  there  been,  on  the  part  of  Congress, 
efforts  at  movement  in  that  direction.  Time  and  again  have  we 
been  assured  by  leading  Republican  journals  that  with  any  increase 
in  the  prospect  of  peace  there  must  be  a  growing  tendency  towards 


42 

the  breaking  down  of  that  only  barrier  which  stands  between  the 
great  fundamental  industries  of  the  country  and  utter  ruin.  The 
great  iron  consumer  spares  no  effort  for  the  accomplishment  of  that 
object,  and  therein  all  the  lesser  consumers  unite  with  it  heart  and 
hand.  Busily  as  the  paper  consumers  are  employed  in  striking 
from  under  their  feet  that  great  branch  of  manufacture  which 
furnishes  the  foundation  on  which  they  stand,  even  more  so  are  you, 
gentlemen,  iron  consumers,  engaged  in  undermining  the  foundations 
on  which  now  stand  the  paper-maker  and  the  printer,  the  spinner 
and  the  weaver,  the  ship-owner  and  the  railroad  proprietor,  the 
machinist  and  the  architect,  the  city  and  the  county  revenues,  the 
State  and  Federal  Governments.  All  of  these,  large  consumers  of 
iron,  are  now  anxiously  awaiting  the  time  when,  to  the  already 
violated  faith  of  the  Union  there  shall  be  added  that  conversion 
into  gold  of  the  taxes  that  have  been  so  heaped  up  on  us— graduated 
as  they  had  been  by  a  paper  standard — which  shall,  when  connected 
with  public  storage,  place  the  foreign  producer  in  the  enviable  posi- 
tion of  being  PROTECTED  BY  THE  AMERICAN  GOVERNMENT  AGAINST 
THE  AMERICAN  IRON  MASTER.  All  of  them  seem  to  be  of  the  belief 
that  by  thus  annihilating  American  competition  for  the  sale  of  iron 
and  increasing  American  competition  for  the  purchase  of  British 
iron  their  demands  must  be  more  cheaply  supplied.  All  of  them 
have  forgotten  the  lesson  taught  by  the  repeated  crises  of  the  British 
free  trade  tariffs  of  1816,  1833,  1846,  and  1857.  All  of  them, 
finally,  seem  to  be  of  the  opinion  that  when  the  foundation  upon 
which  now  rests  our  whole  social  system  shall  have  been  removed, 
the  edifice  will  yet  remain  unharmed.  It  is  a  sad  delusion,  but  as 
it  exists  we  find  ourselves  required  to  look  it  fully  in  the  face  and 
determine  what  it  is  that  our  duty  to  our  country  and  to  our- 
selves requires  us  to  do  in  the  state  of  things  that  has  been  pro- 
duced. 

With  tne  restoration  of  peace  there  will  arise  a  demand  for  labor 
throughout  the  South  that  must  tend  greatly  to  prevent  any  mate- 
rial decrease  in  its  price  throughout  the  North.  Tobacco  and 
cotton  fields  will  thus  become  competitors  with  the  furnaces,  mills, 
factories,  and  other  establishments  now  in  existence,  and  these  latter 
must  for  a  considerable  period  of  time  be  compelled  to  choose  be- 
tween paying  high  wages,  on  the  one  hand,  and  closing  their  works 
on  the  other.  The  present  rate  of  wages  in  the  coal  and  iron  trades 
is  little  less  than  treble  that  of  England,  and  how  little  the  latter 


43 

can  be  expected  to  rise  is  shown  by  the  facts,  that  the  Scottish 
miners,  at  the  close  of  a  turn  out,  on  which  they  expended  all  their 
means  to  the  extent  of  $7,500,000,  have  recently  been  obliged  to 
give  in  and  return  to  work  under  the  wages  against  which  they  had 
rebelled ;  and,  that  the  very  latest  Iron  Trade  Circular  (Birming- 
ham) advises  its  readers,  that  "  the  present  state  of  the  iron  trade 
in  all  parts  of  the  country,  both  in  North  and  South  Staffordshire, 
•South  Wales,  and  the  Cleveland  districts,  justifies,  or  rather  we 
should  say,  forces  their  masters  to  call  upon  the  men  for  a  reduction 
of  wages."  Such  being  the  case,  it  is  clear  that  it  is  not  in  that 
direction  we  can  look  for  any  change  by  which  we  might  hope  to 
profit.  Further  even  than  this,  British  wages  must  rise  so  soon  as 
the  "  wealthy  English  capitalists"  shall  have  had  the  way  opened 
to  them  for  crushing  out  American  competition,  and  then  immigra- 
tion must,  as  we  feel  assured,  fall  to  a  point  lower  than  any  it  has 
touched  since  the  terrific  crisis  of  1842.  In  that  direction,  then,  we 
cannot  look  for  help. 

Taxes  must  be  maintained  at  the  present  standard  should  that 
continue  practicable.  Further,  indeed,  than  this,  they  must,  wherever 
possible,  be  increased,  as  the  nominal  amount  of  business  declines 
with  the  decline  of  prices.  Incomes  will  count  far  less  in  gold  than 
they  now  do  in  paper.  Sales  will  do  the  same,  and  the  gold  received, 
admitting  the  quantity  of  goods  sold  even  to  remain  the  same,  will 
be  one-half  less  than  that  now  received  in  paper.  The  interest  on 
the  debt  will  remain  undiminished.  So,  too,  must  it  be  with  soldiers' 
and  sailors'  wages,  and  the  salaries  of  officers,  civil,  military,  and 
naval — all  of  whom  will  then  be  enabled  to  purchase  twice  the 
quantity  of  commodities  they  can  now  command.  Looking  at  all 
these  facts,  it  seems  to  us  to  be  quite  clear  that  to  meet  the  demands 
of  the  Government  it  will  be  needed  that,  wherever  possible,  the 
taxes  shall  be  raised.  That  they  cannot  be  reduced  is  absolutely 
certain. 

Labor,  for  a  time  at  least,  remaining  unchanged,  and  taxes  con- 
tinuing to  be  collected  on  coal,  oil,  &c.  &c.,  the  cost  of  all  the 
materials  of  iron  must  continue  to  be  so  high  as  to  afford  to  the 
iron  master  only  the  choice  between  closing  his  works,  on  the  one 
hand,  and  ruin  on  the  other.  Transportation,  the  charge  for  which 
has  now  been  carried  up  to  a  point  so  terrific,  will  remain  for  a  time 
unchanged.  Railroad  companies,  having  tasted  the  sweets  of  such 


44 

high  charges,  will  certainly  try  the  experiment  of  breaking  their 
customers  before  they  abandon  them. 

Interest  must  rise  as  bank  loans  decline  in  their  amount.  In  all 
past  crises  it  has  been  from  three  to  six  times  higher  than  has  been 
paid  by  "  wealthy  English  capitalists"  when  they  have  been  com- 
pelled to  carry  heavy  stocks  of  iron. 

Taking  all  these  things  together  we  think  it  quite  safe  to  say 
that,  for  the  first  year  at  least,  the  cost  to  the  American  iron  master 
of  producing  and  transporting  a  ton  of  bars  will  be  greater  by 
twenty  dollars  than  will  be  that  of  a  ton  produced  in  England 
at  the  present  low  rate  of  wages.  Against  this  there  will  be  a 
difference  of  two  dollars  in  the  taxes.  The  protection  of  the 
"  wealthy  English  capitalist"  will  be  complete,  but  where  then  will 
stand  those  American  rivals  who  have  now  so  completely  occupied 
the  domestic  market  as  to  have  greatly  reduced  English  wages, 
and  thus  paved  the  way  for  immigration  from  the  British  soil 
of  tens  of  thousands  of  her  workers  in  coal  and  iron,  whose  services 
have  so  much  been  needed  ?  Once  here,  they  and  their  children 
would  forever  be  customers  to  the  farmers  of  the  Mississippi  Valley. 
Forced  to  remain  where  they  are  they  will,  as  heretofore,  eat  the 
food  of  Russia  or  of  Egypt.  That  they  will  not  come  under  a 
system  that  protects  the  British  capitalist  against  his  American 
competitor  is  very  certain.  The  importation  of  such  machinery, 
capable  of  making  engines,  while  reproducing  themselves,  of  the 
past  year,  is  worth  more  to  the  country  than  all  the  iron  that  has 
ever  come  to  it  from  British  furnaces  since  the  unfortunate  repeal, 
under  Carolinian'  threats  of  secession,  of  the  protective  tariff  of 
1828. 

Such  being  the  existing  state  of  facts,  and  such  the  prospects,  we 
have  now  to  determine  what  we  ourselves  should  do.  To  attempt, 
under  such  circumstances,  to  maintain  a  competition  for  the  sale  of 
iron,  could  result  only  in  a  gradual  depletion  of  every  ironmaster  in 
the  country,  and  in  the  abandonment  of  his  works  after  he  should 
himself  have  been  ruined.  The  day  of  high  prices  would  then  come 
round  again,  but  there  would  exist  no  person  to  profit  of  it.  By 
withdrawing  at  once,  before  the  day  of  exhaustion  had  commenced, 
we  should,  on  the  contrary,  retain  ourselves  in  a  position  to  resume 
work  when  the  day  should  have  arrived  for  giving  a  new  pledge  of 
the  faith  that  has  been  so  often,  and,  as  we  think,  so  discreditably 
violated.  By  adopting  this  latter  course,  we  should  retain  the 


45 

power  to  aid  in  the  re-establishment  of  that  internal  commerce  upon 
which  the  country  is  now  so  entirely  dependent  for  the  power  t» 
maintain  the  Government.  By  pursuing  the  former,  w«  should 
speedily  place  ourselves  in  a  condition  to  require  aid,  instead  of 
granting  it.  After  full  consideration,  therefore,  we  have  arrived  at 
the  conclusion  that  we  should  best  perform  our  duty,  both  public 
and  private,  by  withdrawing  from  competition  with  those  "wealthy 
English  capitalists"  who  are  now  so  anxious  to  sell  cheap  iron,  and 
who  have  always  doubled  their  prices  so  soon  as  they  had  annihi- 
lated their  American  competitors.  You  will,  therefore,  please  to 
receive  this  as  a  notice  that  from  and  after  the  first  of  March  next 
our  works  will  be  closed,  and  you  will  be  free  to  make  such  arrange- 
ments in  regard  to  the  supply  of  iron  as  best  may  suit  your  conve- 
nience. 

Should,  in  the  mean  time,  any  of  you  be  disposed  to  commence 
the  work  of  producing  iron  that  is  to  pay  nearly  as  much  in  taxes 
as  the  foreign  product  pays  'in  the  form  of  duties,  you  can,  as  we 
think,  be  supplied  with  any  number  of  furnaces  and  mills  at  their 
actual  cost,  and  in  very  many  cases  at  less  than  cost. 

Yours,  respectfully,  A.  B. 

C.  D. 
E.  F. 

Such,  as  it  appears  to  me,  is  the  course  that  duty  requires  of  the 
ironmasters  of  the  country  to  pursue.  Past  experience  proves  that 
there  can  be  no  reliance  on  the  pledges  given  to  them  when  the 
country  needs  their  aid.  Foreign  emissaries  haunt  the  halls  of 
Congress,  and  their  presence  there  is  not  alone  tolerated,  but  actu- 
ally courted,  by  gentlemen  who  can  see  advantage  in  enabling  a 
constituent  to  save  a  dollar  or  two  upon  a  few  thousand  tons  of 
iron,  and  who  cannot  see  that  the  power  to  buy  iron  at  any  price 
has  resulted  from  American  competition  for  the  purchase  of  the 
products  of  the  farm,  and  for  the  sale  of  those  yielded  by  the  mine, 
the  furnace,  and  the  rolling-mill.  It  is  time,  therefore,  that  they 
should  now  abandon  the  position  they  so  long  have  occupied,  that 
of  supplicants  for  mercy,  and,  as  the  best  mode  of  serving  the 
country,  maintaining  its  revenue,  and  thus  enabling  its  Government 
to  live,  take  at  once  the  true  ground  that,  in  ceasing  to  grant  pro- 
tection, the  iron  consumers  have  lost  all  claim  upon  them  for  the 
performance  of  duties. 


46 

It  may  perhaps  be  charged  that  this  would  be  combination.  It 
would  be  so,  and  the  time  has  come  for  it.  The  country  has  now 
to  carry  t)n  a  war  with  foreign  capitalists  and  their  agents,  for  the 
maintenance  of  its  credit,  for  the  perpetuation  of  the  Union,  and  for 
the  conversion  of  the  Declaration  of  Independence  into  something 
more  than  a  mere  form  of  words,  and  it  will  be  worsted  if  the  honest 
people  of  the  country  do  not  combine  for  its  support.  By  so  doing, 
they  will  speedily  be  enabled  to  obtain  from  foreign  nations  indem- 
nity for  the  past  and  security  for  the  future,  for  in  that  combina- 
tion they  will  be  sure  to  find  the  way  to  outdo  England  without  fight- 
ing her. 

To  enable  ourselves  to  succeed  we  need  only  that  stability  of 
action  which  shall  give  to  the  capitalists  security  against  foreign 
agitation.  But  a  few  days  since  one  of  the  largest  importers  of 
British  iron  expressed  to  one  of  my  friends  a  wish  that  Congress 
should  take  such  decided  action  as  would  warrant  him  in  turning 
his  capital  from  the  importation  to  the  production  of  this  most 
important  commodity,  the  materials  of  which  so  much  abound 
throughout  the  Union.  Let  it  but  do  this  and  the  day  will  then 
be  close  at  hand  when  the  annual  production  will  count  by  mil- 
lions of  tons,  and  when  our  farmers  will  be  relieved  of  all  necessity 
for  crushing  down,  in  the  regulating  market  of  the  world,  the 
prices  of  all  their  products.  The  annual  saving  thereby  produced 
would  be  greater  in  its  amount  than  the  value  of  all  the  iron  im- 
ported into  the  country  since  the  Peace  of  Ghent. 

In  my  next  I  shall  ask  your  attention  to  the  Farmer's  Question ; 
meanwhile,  my  dear  sir,  remaining, 

Yours,  very  truly, 

HENRY  C.  CAREY. 

Hon.  SCHUYLER  COLFAX. 
PHILADELPHIA,  January  16,  1865. 


THE  FARMER'S  QUESTION. 


LETTER  FIRST. 

DEAR  SIR  : — 

IN  a  former  letter  the  money  value  of  the  products  of  our  coal 
and  iron  mines,  our  furnaces  and  rolling-mills,  was  stated  as  being 
little  less  than  two  hundred  and  fifty  millions.  Following  that  iron 
through  the  foundries  and  machine  shops  we  shall  find  that  those 
industries  are  this  day  yielding  to  the  nation  commodities  whose 
market  value  certainly  exceeds  four  hundred  millions ;  and  then 
following  their  proceeds  we  find  that  nearly  the  whole  is  distributed 
among  the  men  who  own  the  land  and  those  who  cultivate  it. 
Hence  it  is,  that  whenever  those  two  great  industries  prosper  the 
farmer  prospers ;  and  that  when  they  suffer  he  too  becomes  a  heavy 
sufferer. 

Are  the  facts  so  ?  it  may  here  be  asked.     Are  their  proceeds  so 
applied  ?     Let  us  see. 

Of  this  vast  sum  a  very  large  proportion  is  distributed  among 
the  men  who  mine  our  coal  and  ore — men  who  aid  in  transporting 
them — men  who  aid  in  converting  the  two  into  iron — men  who 
puddle  the  iron  and  roll  the  bar — and  other  men  who  convert  the 
bar  into  hoes,  spades,  axes,  knives,  and  engines.  What  becomes 
of  it  then  ?  They  buy  food  for  their  families  and  themselves,  all 
of  which  comes  from  American  farmers.  They  purchase  clothing 
made  of  Western  wool  or  Southern  cotton,  and  converted  by  means 
of  men  and  women  who  tend  the  spindle  and  the  loom  while  eating 
the  food  of  Iowa  and  Minnesota.  They  buy  houses  composed  of 
bricks  and  lumber,  the  one  made,  and  the  other  cut  and  brought  to 
market,  by  men  who  eat  the  pork  of  Ohio  and  the  corn  of  Indiana 
or  of  Illinois.  They  buy  newspapers  whose  types  and  paper  repre- 
sent the  hams  of  Kentucky,  the  wheat  of  Pennsylvania,  and  the 
butter  and  cheese  of  New  York,  while  its  press  represents  the  food 
consumed  in  workshops  which,  in  the  wonderful  character  of  the 
1 


2 

machines  turned  out,  furnish  to  the  world  ?uch  conclusive  proof  that 
were  American  farmers  but  true  to  themselves  American  inge- 
nuity would  speedily  relieve  them  from  the  necessity  for  employing 
themselves  in  raising  food  for  distant  markets,  the  proper  work  of 
the  barbarian  and  the  slave,  and  of  them  alone. 

A  part  of  this  vast  sum  goes,  however,  to  the  owners  of  land 
that  yields  coal,  ore,  or  lime ;  another,  to  those  who  own  furnaces, 
in  which  the  three  are  converted  into  iron,  or  shops  in  which 
iron  is  converted  into  machinery  to  be  used  by  the  farmer,  the 
weaver,  the  locomotive  builder,  and  the  builder  of  ships ;  and  we 
may  now  inquire  what  becomes  of  them.  These  men  have  families, 
and  those  families  likewise  need  food  that  comes  from  American 
farms  ;  clothing  all  of  which,  were  our  farmers  true  to  themselves, 
would  represent  the  products  of  American  agriculture ;  houses 
which  represent  the  labors  of  brickmakers  and  bricklayers,  lumber- 
men, carpenters,  masons,  workers  in  coal,  and  workers  in  iron,  all 
of  them  men  who  help  to  make  the  great  market  in  which  ex- 
changes of  food  to  the  annual  extent  of  thousands  of  millions  of 
dollars  are  now  made.  The  profits  of  some  of  the  owners  of  the 
great  works  from  which  are  now  annually  turned  out  so  many 
millions  of  tons  of  coal,  so  many  hundreds  of  thousands  of  tons  of 
iron,  and  so  many  engines,  are,  however,  as  we  know,  greatly  in 
excess  of  their  expenditure.  What  becomes  of  the  surplus  ?  A 
part  of  it  is  applied  to  the  extension  of  their  works,  and  thus  is 
created  demand  for  labor,  enabling  many  to  obtain  food  and  cloth- 
ing who  otherwise  might  be  unemployed  and  therefore  unable  to 
purchase  either.  Another  part  goes  to  the  making  of  railroads, 
thus  creating  a  further  demand  for  labor,  and  giving  the  farmer  a 
purchaser  for  his  pork  and  his  corn  while  at  the  same  time  increas- 
ing his  facilities  for  reaching  the  distant  markets.  Another  part, 
perhaps,  is  lent  to  the  Government,  and  thus  aids  it  in  paying  the 
farmer  for  the  food,  the  clothing,  and  the  machinery  required  by 
our  armies  in  the  field.  Thus,  of  the  whole  four  hundred  millions, 
large  as  is  the  sum,  it  may,  as  I  believe,  be  safely  assumed  that  more 
than  ninety  per  cent.,  and  perhaps  even  ninety-five,  goes  directly, 
or  indirectly,  to  the  payment  of  labor  that  is  employed  in  clearing 
and  cultivating  the  land. 

Turning  now  back  to  the  period  of  the  British  free  trade  tariffs 
of  1846  and  1857,  we  see  that  hundreds  of  millions  worth  of 
foreign  iron  had  been  imported — part  of  it  in  the  form  of  knives 


and  razors,  very  much  of  it  in  that  of  mere  pig  metal,  and  hun- 
dreds of  thousands  of  tons  in  that  of  rails  to  be  laid  on  lands  the 
larger  part  of  which  abounded  in  fuel  and  in  ore  waiting  alone  the 
application  of  labor  to  their  extraction  and  conversion.  Why  was 
this  ?  Because  the  system  of  that  day  had  been  framed  in  obedience 
to  orders  issued  by  the  men  who  since  have  been  employed  in  build- 
ing pirate  ships  to  be  used  in  driving  from  the  ocean  the  stars  and 
stripes ;  in  fitting  out  other  ships  for  running  our  blockade ;  and 
generally  in  giving  to  the  rebellion  that  aid,  material  and  moral,  by 
help  of  which  a  war  that  should  have  been  finished  in  a  year  has 
been  prolonged  throughout  a  whole  Presidential  term,  and  at  a  cost 
of  hundreds  of  lives  and  hundreds  of  millions  of  property  that  might 
otherwise  have  been  saved. 

For  the  iron,  thus  imported  we  have  paid  hundreds  of  millions 
of  dollars.  What  became  of  them  ?  Did  the  people  who  mined 
the  coal  and  the  ore  employed  in  making  that  iron  eat  American 
wheat  ?  Did  they  wear  clothing  composed  of  com. raised  in  Iowa 
and  wool  sheared  in  Ohio  ?  Did  they  occupy  houses  built  with 
lumber  representing  the  food  of  Michigan  or  Minnesota  ?  Did 
the  workmen  who  built  the  houses  they  occupied  consume  potatoes 
raised  in  Maine,  or  cabbages  raised  in  Pennsylvania  ?  For  an 
answer  to  these  questions  I  give  you  the  following  figures  repre- 
senting the  wheat,  the  wool,  the  flour,  the  pork,  and  the  lumber 
exported — not  alone  to  the  country  from  which  we  had  the  iron, 
but  to  France,  Belgium,  and  Great  Britain,  the  countries  which  have 
deluged  us  with  the  silks,  the  woollens,  the  cottons,  and  the  iron 
by  means  of  the  purchase  of  which  we  have  been  involved  in  a 
foreign  debt  of  $500,000,000  that  now  makes  upon  us,  for  the  mere 
payment  of  interest,  a  demand  to  meet  which  requires  not  less  than 
$30,000,000,  a  sum  more  than  half  the  product  of  California.  The 
years  I  have  taken  are  the  three  which  immediately  preceded  the 
breaking  out  of  the  great  rebellion.  The  country  had  then  for  more 
than  a  decade  enjoyed  the  blessings  of  that  British  free  trade 
which,  as  we  were  assured  in  1847,  was  destined,  before  the  lapse 
of  twenty  years,  to  make  a  demand  for  American  food  whose  annual 
amount  would  count  by  hundreds  of  millions  of  dollars.  To  what 
extent  those  predictions  have  been  realized  will  be  seen  by  the 
following  figures : — 


4 

Total  Export. 


To  Great  Britain,  France, 
and  Belgium. 


1858. 

Pork      . 

.     12,852,492 

$360,000 

Indian  corn    . 

.      3,259,039 

2,163,000 

Lumber          .        . 

.      1,240,000 

215,000 

Wheat  . 

.       9,061,000 

6,436,000 

Wheat  flour  . 

.    19,328,884 

6,006,000 

Wool     . 

389,512 

15,000 

1859. 

Pork      . 

.      3,355,746 

563,000 

Indian  corn    . 

.      1,323,103 

281,000 

Lumber 

.      1,001,216 

247,000 

Wheat  . 

.       2,849,192 

1,402,000 

Wheat  flour  . 

.     14,493,591 

1,147,000 

Wool     ..       » 

355.563 

129,000 

1860. 

Pork       . 

.      2,852,942 

371,000 

Indian  corn    . 

.      3,259,039 

1,894,000 

Lumber 

.      1,240,425 

475,000 

Wheat  . 

.       9,061,504 

6,389,000 

Wheat  flour  . 

.     19,328,880 

5,133,000 

Wool      . 

211,861 

141,000 

Total 

.  $95,463.989 

$32,367,000 

Annual  average 

.     31,821,330 

10,789,000 

The  annual  average,  as  here  is  shown,  of  the  demand  for  these  im- 
portant commodities  by  the  three  great  manufacturing  countries 
of  Europe,  was  less  than  $11,000,000,  or  little  more  than  16  cents 
per  head  of  their  total  population.  A  single  hundred  thousand  of 
their  people  attracted  here  by  large  demand  for  labor  and  liberal 
wages,  would  furnish  a  market  for  the  various  products  of  the  land 
much  greater  in  its  amount. 

The  great  European  market  for  food  that  had  been  promised  to 
our  farmers  had,  as  we  see,  totally  failed.  Had  the  deficiency  of 
demand  thus  produced  been  in  any  manner  made  up  by  immigration  ? 
On  the  contrary,  the  number  of  foreigners  coming  here  to  sell  their 
labor  was  less  in  those  years,  as  has  been  shown  in  a  former  letter 
— less,  too,  by  thirty  per  cent. — than  it  had  been  in  the  year  in 
which  the  British  iron  master's  tariff  of  1846  first  became  endued 
with  power  for  mischief. 

Under  the  free  trade  tariff  of  1841-2  the  markets  furnished  by 
the  coal  and  iron  industries  of  the  country  could  but  little  have  ex- 


ceeded  $50,000,000.  Under  the  protective  tariff  act  of  1842,  that 
market  thrice  increased  in  size,  having,  in  less  than  half  a  dozen 
years,  grown  to  $150',000,000.  In  the  same  time  immigration  had 
also  thrice  increased,  and  as  every  immigrant  became  a  consumer  on 
the  moment  of  his  arrival,  whereas  one  year  at  least  must  elapse 
before  any  one  of  them  could  make  the  slightest  addition  to  the 
quantity  of  food  produced,  it  followed  that  to  the  whole  extent  of 
their  consumption  of  food,  of  wool,  of  cotton,  of  lumber,  and  of  all 
other  of  the  products  of  the  land,  they  constituted  an  addition  to 
the  farmer's  market.  Admitting  that  their  average  power  to  earn 
wages  amounted  to  but  $150  a  year,  the  addition  amounted  to 
$25,000,000.  The  movement  had,  however,  then  only  just  com- 
menced. The  more  iron  made  in  1846  the  greater  was  the  quantity 
required  in  184vT ;  and  the  more  made  in  this  latter  year  the  greater 
would  have  been  the  quantity  required  in  1848,  '49,  and  'oO  ;  and 
the  greater  the  immigration  of  1847  the  more  would  have  been  its 
tendency  to  increase  in  each  and  every  of  the  succeeding  years,  had 
protection  been  maintained.  Had  it  been  so,  our  coal  and  iron  in- 
dustries would  this  day  amount  to  more  than  $1,000,000,000,  making 
demand  to  nearly  the  whole  of  that  vast  amount  for  the  fruits  of 
the  earth,  while  immigration  would  by  this  time  have  been  giving 
us  a  million  per  annum  of  European  workmen,  consumers,  from  the 
moment  of  their  arrival,  of  the  products  of  American  farms,  and 
busily  engaged  in  the  work  of  further  increasing  by  procreation  the 
number  of  mouths  requiring  further  supplies  of  food  and  wool. 

We  were  told,  however,  that  iron  masters  were  too  rapidly  grow- 
ing rich ;  that  the  taxes  imposed  for  their  benefit  on  iron  con- 
sumers were  so  great  that  they  amounted  to  more  than  the  whole 
price  at  which  their  finished  products  could  be  bought ;  that  the 
farmers  were  thus  made  mere  "  hewers  of  wood  and  drawers  of 
water"  for  great  monopolists ;  that  protection  closed  the  markets 
of  Europe  against  their  "  breadstuffs ;"  that  we  were  essentially 
an  agricultural  people,  and  so  likely  to  remain  ;  that  we  there- 
fore needed  free  trade ;  and  that,  for  all  these  reasons,  protection 
should  be  abandoned.  It  was  abandoned,  and  we  have  now  the 
result  in  the  facts,  that  we  had  given  up  a  domestic  market  among 
the  producers  of  coal,  iron,  copper,  lead,  and  cloth,  which  then 
amounted  to  hundreds  of  millions,  and  would  since  then  have 
arrived  at  thousands  of  millions,  and  had,  at  the  close  of  the  system 


6 

inaugurated  in  its  stead,  obtained  in  exchange  a  market  which  took 
from  us  of  pork,  corn,  wheat,  flour,  wool,  and  lumber,  less  than 
$11,000,000  a  year,  or  one-third  of  a  dollar  per  head  of  our  then 
population.  Such  had  been  the  results  obtained  in  1860  by  means 
of  agitation  on  the  part  of  those  British  agents  by  whom  had 
been  represented  in  1846,  in  the  Halls  of  the  Capitol,  those  wealthy 
capitalists  of  England  whose  first  desire  was  that  food  might  be 
obtained  more  cheaply  while  iron  should  command  a  higher  price. 

Did  they  obtain  their  end  ?  To  obtain  an  answer  to  this  question 
we  may  here  compare  the  prices  in  the  New  York  market  at  the 
commencement  and  the  close  of  that  period  of  the  British  free  trade 
system  which  dates  from  December,  1846.  As  given  in  a  table 
now  before  me,  they  are  as  follows  : — 

.1847.  1858.  1859.  1860. 

Wheat  flour        .        .  7  68  4  25  5  50  5  50 

Rye  flour    .        .        .  5  06  3  40  3  75  3  50 

Corn  meal  .         .        .  4  62  3  50  3  90  3  80 

Pork  .        .         .         .  14  93  18  35  16  35  17  75 

Mess  Beef  .         .        .  12  00  11  50  8  25  5  25 

Butter        ...  25  25  22  J  18 

In  the  period  intervening  between  the  first  and  last  of  these 
dates,  California  and  Australia  had  given  to  the  world  probably 
$800,000,000  in  gold,  and  yet,  instead  of  increasing  as  it  should 
have  done,  the  power  of  the  farmer  to  obtain  money  in  exchange  for 
his  products  had  largely  diminished. 

The  reason  for  this  was  to  be  found  in  the  fact,  that  determining 
to  go  abroad  to  get  his  iron  and  his  cloth  he  had  destroyed  his 
great  market.  To  what  extent  this  had  been  done  you  may,  my 
dear  sir,  judge  for  yourself  after  referring  to  an  extract  from  an 
Address  of  one  of  the  Charitable  Societies  of  New  York,  given  in 
a  former  letter,  but  here  reproduced  because  of  its  important  bearing 
on  the  question  now  before  us  : — 

"  Up  to  the  present  the  Association  has  relieved  6,922  families,  contain- 
ing 26,896  persons,  many  of  whom  are  families  of  unemployed  mechanics  and 
widows  with  dependent  children,  who  cannot  subsist  without  aid.  As  the 
season  advances  the  destitution  will  increase.  Last  winter  it  was  thrice 
as  great  in  January  as  in  December,  and  did  not  reach  its  height  until  the 
close  of  February." 

This  paper  bears  date  more  than  a  year  previous  to  the  great 
crisis  of  1857.  Subsequently  thereto  the  state  of  things  was  very 


far  worse  than  that  above  described.  Our  public  warehouses  were 
filled  with  foreign  merchandise,  always  ready  to  supply  the  material 
of  auction  sales.  Our  auctioneers,  constantly  at  work,  supplied 
wholesale  and  retail  dealers,  at  prices  fixed  by  themselves.  Our 
shops  were  gorged  so  thoroughly  with  foreign  food  and  labor  in 
every  form,  from  the  coarsest  woollens  to  the  finest  silks,  as  to  leave 
no  place  for  the  domestic  food  and  labor  that  sought  a  market. 
Such  was  the  mode  of  "  warfare,"  by  means  of  which  "  the  most 
wealthy  capitalists"  of  Britain  had  been  enabled  to  "overwhelm  all 
foreign  competition  in  times  of  great  depression,  and  thus  to  clear 
the  way  for  the  whole  trade  to  step  in,  when  prices  revived,  and  to 
carry  on  a  great  business,  before  foreign  capital  could  accumu- 
late to  such  an  extent  as  to  be  able  to  establish  a  competition  in 
prices  with  any  chance  of  success,"  Such,  my  dear  sir,  was  the 
sort  of  warfare,  by  means  of  which  Ireland  and  India  had  been 
ruined,  without  the  necessity  for  firing  a  gun,  or  drawing  a  sword. 
Such  was  the  warfare  against  which  your  fellow-citizens,  for  ten 
years  previously,  had  sought,  but  vainly  sought,  to  be  protected — 
the  only  answer  to  the  petitions  having  been,  that  the  duties  of  the 
government  were  limited  to  the  task  of  protecting  itself,  leaving  the 
people  to  protect  themselves  as  best  they  could. 

As  a  consequence  of  this  it  was  :  that  after  a  growth  of  pauper- 
ism steadily  continued  during  all  those  years,  it  suddenly  so  much 
expanded  that  hundreds  of  thousands  of  our  people  were  wholly 
unable  to  sell  their  labor,  or  to  purchase  food  and  clothing : 

That  factories,  mills,  mines,  and  furnaces,  the  cost  of  which  had 
counted  by  hundreds  of  millions  of  dollars,  were  then  closed,  and 
likely  so  to  remain  : 

That  the  power  to  diversify  the  employments  of  society  was  then 
declining  from  day  to  day  : 

That,  simultaneously  therewith,  we  were  adding  to  our  population 
a  million  of  persons  annually  : 

That  the  necessity  for  resorting  to  the  labors  of  the  field,  as 
affording  the  only  means  of  support,  was  steadily  increasing  : 

That  the  supply  of  food  tended,  therefore,  to  augment,  as  the 
domestic  consumption  declined :  and 

That  its  price  tended,  therefore,  steadily  to  fall,  and  was,  at  the 
outset  of  the  war,  likely  to  be  lower  than  had  ever  yet  been  known. 

The  production  of  iron  had  largely  decreased,  as  under  such 


8 

circumstances  might  readily  be  supposed.  What,  however,  was  its 
import  ?  Did  the  figures  there  presented  furnish  any  evidence  of 
increase  of  power  on  the  part  of  the  farmer  to  purchase  hoes  or 
ploughs,  or  on  that  of  the  miner  to  purchase  engines  ?  Let  us  see. 

In  the  three  years  above  referred  to  there  was  imported  of  iron 
and  manufactures  of  iron,  to  the  extent  of  $45,000,000,  giving  an 
annual  average  of  $15,000,000,  or  less  than  fifty  cents  per  head  of 
our  population.  In  the  hope  to  secure  some  trifling  reduction  iu 
its  price  our  farmer  had  been  persuaded  to  throw  away  a  market 
that  then  amounted  to  hundreds  of  millions,  and  that  would,  before 
1860,  have  reached  thousands  of  millions,  and  now  the  whole 
amount  taken  from  him  of  his  chief  products,  by  the  three 
principal  manufacturing  nations  of  Europe,  was  barely  sufficient  to 
pay  for  the  little  iron  that  be  could  afford  to  purchase  and  the 
freight  upon  it ;  that  freight,  too,  paid  chiefly  for  the  use  of  British 
ships.  As  a  necessary  consequence,  the  country  was  running  in 
debt  from  day  to  day  more  deeply,  and  the  interest  on  that  debt 
was  even  then  absorbing  more  than  half  the  gold  yielded  by 
California.  Hence  it  had  been  that  the  prices  of  the  farmer's 
products  had  fallen  in  price  as  the  supplies  of  the  precious  metals 
had  so  rapidly  increased.  Busily  engaged  in  selling  skins  at  six- 
pence each,  and  taking  pay  therefor  in  tails  at  a  shilling,  he  had 
been  giving  all  his  efforts  at  increasing  the  power  of  that  great 
combination  of  "  wealthy  English  capitalists,"  the  primary  object 
of  all  whose  operations  had  been  that  of  depressing  the  prices  of 
food  and  raising  the  price  of  iron — diminishing  still  further  that 
of  the  skins  aud  raising  still  higher  that  of  the  tails. 

The  most  useful  to  the  British  traders  of  all  the  British  colonies 
is  that  one  which  embraces  these  United  States.  Content  with  the 
word  "independence,"  Americans  take  no  care  to  make  themselves 
or  thei^r  country  independent.  So  far  the  reverse  is  it,  indeed,  that, 
while  talking  largely  of  the  Monroe  Doctrine,  they  permit  their 
laws  to  be  dictated  to  them  by  British  agents,  representing  "  wealthy 
capitalists,"  who  now  seek  to  perpetuate  throughout  this  Western 
Continent  the  system  so  well  described  in  the  following  passage 
by  one  of  their  predecessors  of  the  last  century  : — 

"  Manufactures  in  our  American  colonies  should  be  discouraged, 
prohibited."  *  *  "We  ought  always  to  keep  a  watchful  eye 
over  our  colonies,  to  restrain  them  from  netting  up  any  of  the  manu- 


9 

fa.ctures  which  are  carried  on  in  Great  Britain;  and  any  snch 
attempts  should  be  crushed  in  the  beginning."  *  *  "Our  colo- 
nies are  much  in  the  same  state  as  Ireland  was  in,  when  they  began 
the  woollen  manufactory,  and  as  their  numbers  increase,  will  fall 
upon  manufactures  for  clothing  themselves,  if  due  care  be  not  taken 
to  find  employment  for  them,  in  raising  such  productions  as  may 
enable  them  to  furnish  themselves  with  all  the  necessaries  from  us." 

*  *     "As  they  will  have  the  providing  rough  materials  to  them- 
selves, so  shall  we  have  the  manufacturing  of  them.     If  encourage- 
ment be  given  for  raising  hemp,  flax,  &c.,  doubtless  they  will  soon 
begin  to  manufacture,  if  not  prevented.     Therefore,  to  atop  the  pro- 
gress of  any  such  manufacture,  it  is  proposed  that  no  weaver  have 
liberty  to  set  up  any  looms,  without  first  registering  at  an  office, 
kept  for  that  purpose."      *      *      "That  all  slitting-mills,  and 
engines  for  drawing  wire  or  weaving  stockings,  be  put  down."    *    * 
"  That  all  negroes  be  prohibited  from  weaving  either   linen  or 
woollen,  or  spinning  or  combing  wool,  or  working  at  any  manufac- 
ture of  iron,  further  than  making  it  into  pig  or  bar  iron.     That 
they  also  be  prohibited  from   manufacturing  hats,  stockings,  or 
leather  of  any  kind.     This  limitation  will  not  abridge  the  planters 
of  any  liberty  they  now  enjoy— on  the  contrary,  it  will  then  turn 
their  industry  to  promoting  and  raising  those  rough  materials." 

*  *     "  If  we  examine  into  the  circumstances  of  the  inhabitants 
of  our  plantations,  and  our  own,  it  will  appear  that  not  one-fourth 
of  their  product  redounds  to  their  own,  profit,  for,  out  of  all  that 
comes  here,  they  only  -carry  back  clothing  and  other  accommoda- 
tions for  their  families,  all  of  which  is  of  the  merchandise  and 
manufacture  of  this  kingdom."     *     *     "All  these  advantages  we 
receive  by  the  plantations,  besides  the  mortgages  on  the  planters'1 
estates  and  the  high  interest  they  pay  us,  which  is  very  consider- 
able."— (GEE  on  Trade,  London,  1750.) 

A  century  earlier  the  Germans  had  ridiculed  the  people  of  Eng- 
land as  men  who  sold  skins  for  sixpence  and  bought  back  the  tails 
at  a  shilling.  Protection  had  changed  all  this.  It  had  brought  the 
English  artisan  to  take  his  place  by  the  side  of  the  English  farmer, 
and  now  the  English  trader  desired  to  do  by  the  American  colonist 
what  the  .German  had  previously  done  by  him — giving  his  whole 
efforts  to  the  work  of  compelling  the  sale  to  him  of  skins  at  six- 
pence and  the  purchase  from  him  of  tails  at  a  shilling.  Thus  far 
they  had,  with  us,  most  thoroughly  succeeded,  and  had  done  so 
by  help  of  the  very  farmers  by  means  of  whose  plunder  they  had 
obtained  the  power  which  recently  has  been  so  much  increased,  and 
of  the  exercise  of  which  we  have  now  so  much  reason  to  complain. 

To  that  great  error  on  the  part  of.  American  farmers  we  have 


10 

been  indebted  for  the  present  war.  What  are  the  facts  bearing  on 
their  present  condition  and  future  prospects,  that  have  been  de- 
veloped in  its  course,  and  what  the  measures  required  for  enabling 
us  to  otttdo  England  without  fighting  her,  and  thus  achieve  an  inde- 
pendence that  shall  be  something  more  than  a  mere  form  of  words, 
I  propose  to  show  in  another  letter,  meanwhile  remaining, 

Yours,  very  truly, 

HENRY  C.  CAREY. 

Hon.  S.  COLFAX. 

PHILADELPHIA,  January  20, 1865. 


THE  FARMER'S  QUESTION. 


LETTER   SECOND. 

DEAR  SIR  : — 

THE  period,  1858-60,  embraced  in  the  returns  given  in  my  last, 
was  one  of  peace,  and  much  of  the  food  of  the  West  yet  continued 
to  pass  southward  on  its  way  to  European  markets.  Wheat  took 
the  form  of  flour,  and  corn  became  pork,  for  the  supply  of  men  en- 
gaged in  raising  and  forwarding  cotton.  The  latter  went  abroad, 
there  to  be  combined  with  Polish  and  Russian  wheat,  to  be  thence 
returned  to  the  poor  farmer  of  Wisconsin  who  was  glad  to  obtain 
even  a  single  yard  of  indifferent  cotton  cloth  in  pay  for  a  bushel  of 
corn  that  had  been  exchanged  in  the  market  of  Manchester  for  fif- 
teen or  twenty  yards.  He  was  thus  giving  whole  skins  for  sixpence 
and  taking  his  pay  in  tails  at  a  shilling ;  as  a  consequence  of  which 
he  was  always  in  debt,  and  always  glad  to  borrow  a  little  money, 
even  when  obliged  to  pay  for  the  use  of  it  at  the  extraordinary  rates 
of  20,  30,  40,  50,  and  even,  as  I  have  understood,  60  per  cent,  per 
annum.  Why  was  this  ?  Not  certainly  because  of  any  absence 
of  fertility  in  the  soil,  that  of  the  Mississippi  Yalley  being  equal  in 
all  natural  powers  to  any  other  in  the  world.  Not  because,  as  in 
Europe,  of  any  necessity  for  paying  rent  to  a  greedy  landlord,  for 
he  had  already  attained  to  the  position  so  much  coveted  by  the 
working  class  of  Europe,  that  of  landed  proprietor.  Why  then  was 
it  ?  Because  he  had,  of  his  own  motion,  made  himself  the  mere 
serf  of  the  class  whose  operations  were  so  well  described  in  the  pas- 
sage given  at  the  close  of  my  last ;  of  that  class  which  desires  that 
food  may  be  cheap  and  cloth  and  iron  dear ;  of  that  one  which 
seeks  to  compel  all  the  farmers  of  the  world  to  bring  their  products  to 
a  single  diminutive  market,  there  to  sell  what  they  have  and  to  buy 
what  they  need  ;  of  that  one  which  talks  of  free  trade  while  seeking 
to  create  for  itself  an  absolute  monopoly  of  machinery  of  conversion 
and  exchange;  of  that  one,  in  fine,  which  now  stands  indebted  to  him 


12 

and  others  like  him  for  all  the  power  which  has,  in  the  past  four 
years,  been  used  for  the  destruction  of  our  commerce  on  the  seas, 
for  the  maintenance  of  the  rebellion,  and  for  the  annihilation  of  that 
Union  upon  whose  prolonged  existence  is  now  dependent  the  whole 
future  of  the  laboring  classes  not  of  America  alone,  but  of  the  world 
at  large. 

The  war  having  closed  the  South  against  the  products  of  the 
West,  there  arose  a  necessity  for  seeking  a  market  somewhere  in 
the  East.  Where,  however,  could  they  have  even  looked  for  it,  had 
we  continued  to  maintain  that  British  free  trade  system  under  which 
we  had  been  made  so  almost  entirely  dependent  upon  distant  nations 
for  supplies  of  cloth  and  iron  ?  Look  as  they  might  it  could 
nowhere  have  been  found.  Happily,  secession  brought  with  it,  and 
on  the  instant,  a  power  on  the  part  of  the  North  which  speedily  ex- 
hibited itself  in  the  re-adoption  of  that  protective  system  by  means 
of  which  the  value  of  the  products  of  our  coal  and  iron  mines,  our 
furnaces  and  rolling  mills,  has  been  carried  up  to  two  hundred  and 
fifty  millions  of  dollars,  making  demand,  in  a  thousand  ways,  for  the 
fruits  of  the  earth  to  little  short  of  that  vast  amount.  The  effect 
of  the  creation  of  this  great  market  exhibits  itself  in  the  Message 
of  Governor  Yates,  of  Illinois,  just  now  delivered,  the  following 
extract  from  which  is  recommended  to  the  careful  consideration  of 
the  farmers  of  the  country  : — 

"As  a  State,  notwithstanding  the  war,  we  have  prospered  beyond  all 
former  precedents.  Notwithstanding  nearly  two  hundred  thousand  of  the 
most  athletic  and  vigorous  of  our  population  have  been  withdrawn  from  the 
field  of  production,  the  area  of  land  now  under  cultivation  is  greater  than 
at  any  former  period,  and  the  census  of  1865  will  exhibit  an  astonishing 
increase  in  every  department  of  material  industry  and  advancement ;  in 
a  great  increase  of  agricultural,  manufacturing,  and  mechanical  wealth  ; 
in  new  and  improved  modes  for  production  of  every  kind  ;  in  the  substitu- 
tion of  machinery  for  the  manual  labor  withdrawn  by  the  war ;  in  the 
triumphs  of  invention ;  in  the  wonderful  increase  of  railroad  enterprise  : 
in  the  universal  activity  of  business,  in  all  its  branches  ;  in  the  rapid 
growth  of  our  cities  and  villages  ;  in  the  bountiful  harvests,  and  in  an 
unexampled  material  prosperity,  prevailing  on  every  hand  ;  while,  at  the 
same  time,  the  educational  institutions  of  the  people  have  in  no  way  de- 
clined. Our  colleges  and  schools,  of  every  class  and  grade,  are  in  the  most 
flourishing  condition  ;  our  benevolent  institutions,  State  and  private,  are 
kept  up  and  maintained  ;  and,  in  a  word,  our  prosperity  is  as  complete 
and  ample  as  though  no  tread  of  armies  or  beat  of  drum  had  been  heard 
in  all  our  borders."  • 


13 

It  may  be  said,  however,  that  the  Government  demand  for  food 
has  had  much  to  do  with  the  change  for  the  better  that  is  here  ex- 
hibited. Whence,  however,  has  the  National  Treasury  obtained  the 
means  by  which  it  has  been  enabled  to  pay  its  troops  and  buy  their 
food  ?  Whence  have  come  the  vast  sums  required  for  fitting  out 
our  present  enormous  fleets  ?  Whence  have  come  those  required  for 
constructing  roads  in  Illinois  and  other  Western  States  ?  Why  is 
it  that  the  people  have  been,  in  time  of  war,  enabled  to  do  so  much 
when  in  the  previous  time  of  peace  they  could  do  so  very  little  ? 
For  an  answer  to  all  these  questions,  my  dear  sir,  allow  me  to  ask 
you  to  look  to  the  following  exhibit  of  the  movements  of  the  New 
York  savings  banks  in  the  last  seven  years  : — 

No.  of  Banks.      Amt.  of  Deposits.         No.  of  Depositors. 

Jan.  1,  1858  ...  54  $41,422,672  203,804 

"       1859  ...  56  48,194,847  230,074 

"       1860  ...  64  58,178,160  273,697 

"       1861  ...  71  67,440,397  300,693 

"       1862  ...  74  64,083,119  300,511 

"       1863  ...  71  76,538,183  347,184 

"       1864  ...  71  93,786,384  400,194 

We  have  here  400,000  little  capitalists,  the  average  of  whose 
savings  is  but  $235,  giving  us  a  total  of  little  less  than  a  hundred 
millions  of  dollars.  Two  of  those  banks  are  specially  devoted  to 
the  care  of  the  funds  of  immigrants,  and  the  following  figures  ex- 
hibit the  extent  of  their  operations  : — 

Kesonrces.  No.  of  Depositors. 

Jan.  1,  1860      ....       2,442,048  10,300 

"       1861     .        .        .        .      3,420,321  14,838 

"       1862     .        .        .        .       3,471,777  14,365 

"       1863     ....      4,475,291  18,621 

"       1864     .        .        .        .       6,056,600  24,151 

Turning  now  to  Massachusetts,  we  find  the  increase  of  deposits 
in  the  four  years,  1860-63,  to  have  been  more  than  a  third  of  the 
total  amount  deposited  in  all  the  long  period  that  previously  had 
elapsed.  The  actual  increase  was  $17,503,000,  of  which  no  less 
than  $12,150,000  took  place  in  '62  and  '63.  The  mere  savings  of 
two  States,  in  two  yeark,  thus  present  us  with  an  increase  of  capital 
exceeding  $40,000,000,  a  sum  that  is  one-half  as  great  as  that  of 
the  whole  British  capital  that,  twenty-five  years  since,  had  been 
applied  to  the  building  of  the  mills,  workshops,  and  warehouses, 


and  to  the  creation  of  the  machinery,  required  for  the  then  gigantic 
cotton  manufacture. 

When  furnaces  and  factories  are  being  increased  in  number  labor 
is  in  demand,  wages  rise,  immigration  grows,  and  the  power  of  accu- 
mulation increases ;  and  hence  it  is,  that  with  every  step  in  that 
direction  we  witness  a  manifestation  of  greater  power  for  further 
progress.  From  '58  to  '61,  notwithstanding  a  large  increase  in  the 
number  of  New  York  banks,  and  consequent  wide  extension  of  their 
field  of  operations,  the  increase  of  deposits  was  but  $26,000,000. 
The  first  year  of  the  war  brought  with  it  a  shock  that  caused  sus- 
pension of  business,  accompanied  by  great  decline  of  wages,  and  the 
result,  as  we  see,  exhibited  itself  in  a  large  diminution  of  deposits. 
The  second  year  of  war  brought  with  it  that  revival  of  demand  for 
labor  which  had  always  previously  attended  the  re-establishment  of 
protection,  and  with  it  came  an  increase  of  deposits  amounting,  in 
the  two  succeeding  years,  to  lit'tle  less  than  $30,000,000.  That 
increase,  too,  was  obtained  without  any  extension  of  the  field  of 
operations,  the  number  of  banks  in  the  last  year  having  been  actu- 
ally less  than  it  had  been  two  years  before. 

With  the  increased  demand  for  labor  consequent  upon  the  creation 
of  a  great  domestic  market  for  food  the  whole  country  has  become 
one  great  savings'  bank,  as  a  consequence  of  which  the  State  and 
Federal  Governments  have  been  enabled  to  collect  thousands  of 
millions  where  before  they  could  scarcely  obtain  hundreds,  the  peo- 
ple meanwhile  creating  for  themselves  machinery  of  production  and 
transportation  to  an  extent  greater  than  ever  before  had  been  created 
in  the  same  period  of  time  in  any  country  of  the  world.* 

It  may  be  said,  however,  that  there  has  been  a  European  demand 
for  our  provisions  and  our  bread-stuffs,  and  such  has  certainly  been 
the  case.  Just  at  the  moment  when  the  Southern  demand  ceased 
Providence  was  pleased,  in  mercy  to  us,  to  afflict  the  people  beyond 
the  Atlantic  with  two  successive  crops  both  of  which  were  much 
below  the  average,  and  thus  was  created  one  of  those  unexpected 
demands  for  which,  under  the  British  free  trade  system,  our  far- 

*  In  1857,  there  were  in  operation  26,210  miles  of  railroad.  In  1861, 
31,800,  giving  an  average  increase  of  1,120  miles  per  annum.  Last  year 
there  were  35,000,  giving  an  annnal  increase  of  1,067  per  annum — that 
obtained,  too,  at  a  time  when  the  demand  for  services  in  the  mills,  mines, 
and  factories  of  the  country,  and  in  the  field,  had  doubled,  even  where  it 
had  not  trebled  the  price  of  labor. 


15 

mers  are  compelled  so  fervently  and  so  frequently  to  pray,  though 
knowing  well  that  short  crops  abroad  must  bring  famine,  distress, 
and  ruin  to  thousands  and  tens  of  thousands  of  men  who,  like  them- 
selves, have  wives  and  children  to  support.  The  momentary 
effect  exhibits  itself  in  the  fact  that  in  the  three  years  ending  June 
30,  1863,  our  exports  of  the  principal  articles  of  food  were  as 
follows : — 


1860-61 

1861-62 

1862-63 

Wheat 

$38,313,624 

$42,573,295 

$31,430,270 

Flour  . 

24,645,289 

27,534,677 

25,458,989 

Corn    .        . 

6,890,865 

10,387,383 

3,321,526 

Pork    . 

2,609,818 

3,980,153 

4,334,775 

Hams  and  bacon 

4,729,297 

10,004,521 

15,775,570 

$77,188,893          $94,480,029          $80,321,130 

What,  however,  were  the  prices  at  which  these  commodities  were 
given  to  the  European  world  ?  'What  was  the  great  bonus  that 
even  then,  in  times  of  scarcity,  was  paid  to  American  farmers  in 
return  for  closing  up  in  1846  a  market  among  our  miners  of  coal 
and  iron,  lead  and  copper,  that  would  before  that  day  have  amounted 
to  thousands  of  millions  of  dollars  ?  Let  us  see. 

As  given  in  the  Reports  of  Commerce  and  Navigation,  the  export 
prices,  reckoned  for  the  first  year  in  gold,  and  for  the  subsequent 
ones  in  paper,  were  as  follows  : — 

1860-61  1861-62  1862-63 

Wheat,  per  bushel          .        .  $1  22  $1  29  $1  33 

Flour,  per  barrel     ...  5  00  5  70  6  40 

Corn,  per  bushel     ...  62  55  66 

Pork,  per  barrel      .         .         .  17  00  13  00  13  00 

Hams,  &c.,  per  pound  10  8£  10£ 

Deducting  from  these  prices  the  heavy  charges  of  transportation 
and  converting  the  balance  into  gold  it  must  be  clearly  seen  that  it 
is  not  in  that  direction  we  are  to  seek  the  cause  of  the  improvement 
now  observed  in  the  condition  of  the  agricultural  population  of 
Illinois  and  other  loyal  States.  Where  then  shall  it  besought? 
In  the  direction  of  the  production  of  commodities  that  do  not  bear 
transportation,  and  that  are  dependent  for  a  market  upon  the 
domestic  demand  alone.  Read  over,  my  dear  sir,  the  passage  above 
given  as  descriptive  of  the  condition  of  Illinois,  and  you  will  see 
that  it  indicates  demand  for  commodities  whose  bulk,  or  whose  de- 
licacy, forbids  transportation.  Potatoes  and  turnips,  of  which  the 


16 

earth  yields  by  hundreds  of  bushels  to  the  acre,  cannot  be  raised 
where  the  domestic  market  has  no  existence.  When,  however,  the 
coal  mine,  the  lead  mine,  or  the  iron  ore  mine,  comes  to  be  opened, 
the  market  is  at  once  created,  and  it  extends  itself  with  every  new 
furnace,  every  new  factory,  every  new  rolling  mill,  until  at  length 
the  farmer  everywhere  obtains  the  power  to  determine  for  himself 
whether  to  raise  thousands  of  bushels  of  potatoes,  or  hundreds  of 
bushels  of  wheat ;  and  then  it  is  that  the  Declaration  of  Independ- 
ence becomes  to  him  something  more  than  a  mere  form  of  words ; 
then  it  is  that  it  becomes  a  reality  and  a  blessing. 

That  independence,  however,  is  precisely  what  the  "wealthy 
English  capitalist"  does  not  desire  that  he  shall  obtain.  What  he 
desires  is,  that  the  distant  farmer  shall  have  no  market  near 
him ;  that  he  shall  be  compelled  to  limit  himself  to  the  produc- 
tion of  commodities  of  which  the  earth  yields  little,  and  that  can, 
therefore,  go  to  that  distant  market  in  which  Russian,  Polish, 
German,  Egyptian,  and  American  food  producers  are  to  contend 
with  each  other  as  to  which  shall  sell  most  cheaply — then  again 
competing  with  each  other  for  raising  the  prices  of  all  the  com- 
modities they  need  to  purchase.  In  this  manner  it  is  that  he  buys 
skins  at  sixpence  while  selling  tails  at  a  shilling.  By  this  it  is 
that  he  is  enabled  to  put  into  his  own  pocket  three-fourths  of  the 
produce  of  the  labor  of  those  poor  and  distant  serfs  to  whom  occa- 
sionally, and  as  a  great  favor,  he  lends  a  little  of  his  surplus  profits 
to  be  applied  to  the  making  of  new  roads  by  means  of  which  popu- 
lation may  be  more  widely  scattered,  while  he  himself  is  thereby 
relieved  from  the  danger  of  any  increase  in  the  competition  for  the 
purchase  of  wool,  rags,  or  corn,  or  for  the  sale  of  cloth  and  iron, 
the  commodities  of  which  he  is  the  owner. 

The  market  whose  prices  for  food  regulate  those  of  all  the  world 
is  that  of  Great  Britain.  Whatever  raises  prices  there  raises  those 
of  New  York  and  Boston,  Chicago  and  St.  Louis.  How  trivial 
was  the  quantity  that  in  the  first  three  years  of  the  war  was  absorbed 
by  that  market,  and  how  low  were  the  prices  obtained,  have  above 
been  shown.  Why  were  prices,  at  a  time  of  real  scarcity,  so  very 
low?  Because  we  had  so  much  to  sell.  ,  Had  only  one-fourth  of 
what  we  sent  been  retained  at  home  for  the  consumption  of  men 
engaged  in  mining  coal  and  ore  and  making  iron,  while  another 
fourth  had  been  retained  for  the  supply  of  men,  women,  and  children 
coming  from  abroad  to  work  in  our  mines,  our  factories,  and  our 


17 

fields,  we  should  have  obtained  almost  as  much  for  the  remaining 
half  as  we  did  obtain  for  the  whole.  That,  however,  is  not  all. 
Had  we  sent  but  one-half  the  quantity,  and  had  the  difference  of 
price  thus  produced  been  but  a  single  shilling  sterling  per  bushel, 
that  difference  would  have  been  felt  by  every  bushel  of  the  whole 
thousand  millions  produced  in  the  loyal  States,  giving  to  be  divided 
among  their  producers  an  additional  two  hundred  and  fifty  millions 
of  dollars,  and  enabling  them  to  buy  more  cloth  and  more  iron, 
and  thus  to  live  better,  while  so  improving  their  machinery  of  pro- 
duction as  to  give  them  greatly  more  to  sell  in  succeeding  years. 
Had  it  made,  as  it  certainly  would  have  done,  a  difference  of 
eighteen  pence  a  bushel,  the  difference  to  our  farmers — leaving 
altogether  out  of  view  corresponding  differences  in  the  prices  of 
all  their  other  products — would  have  been  little  less  than  four 
hundred  millions.  That  amount,  at  the  least,  is  it  that  they  have 
paid  in  each  of  the  last  three  years,  for  having,  during  a  long  period 
of  years,  so  repeatedly  crushed  out  the  cotton  and  woollen  manu- 
factures, the  coal,  iron,  and  other  important  branches  of  industry ; 
and  in  that  way  it  has  been  that  they  have  built  up,  at  their  own 
cost,  "the  large  capitals"  which  have  so  systematically  been  used 
by  our  British/Henc/s  as  "the  great  instruments  of  warfare  against 
the  competing  capital  of  other  countries."  They,  themselves,  make 
the  whip  whose  lash  they  so  severely  feel.  They,  themselves,  fashion 
the  club  by  means  of  which  they  are  struck  down  at  the  feet  of  their 
foreign  masters.  They,  themselves,  by  tolerating  among  their  Re- 
presentatives a  perpetual  agitation  of  the  British  free  trade  ques- 
tion, are  now  paving  the  way  for  a  return  to  a  state  of  colonial 
subjection  greater  than  has  existed  at  any  period  since  the  peace  of 
1783. 

For  proof  of  this  allow  me  now  to  request  you  to  look  at  the 
consequences  that  must  inevitably  follow  from  the  recent  action  of 
your  House  in  regard  to  the  paper  manufacture.  Under  that 
action  printing  paper  can  no  longer  be  made  in  this  country,  and 
we  have  now  to  choose  between  going  abroad  for  $25,000,000  of 
paper,  or  dispensing  with  our  usual  supplies  of  journals  and  of 
books. 

Under  the  action  of  the  last  session  we  shall,  whenever  the  price 
of  gold  falls,  be  obliged  to  go  abroad  for,  as  I  believe,  the  whole  of 
the  iron  now  produced,  and  the  whole  of  the  coal  now  employed  in 
making  iron.  Taking  these  two  items  together,  and  placing  them 


18 

at  a  gold  value  of  only  $150,000,000,  the  question  now  arises  as  to 
how  we  are  to  pay  for  them  ?  Seeking  au  answer  to  this  question 
we  are  led  naturally  to  look  to  the  state,  in  regard  to  prices  and 
demand,  of  the  great  regulating  market  of  the  world,  and,  fortu- 
nately, one  of  the  New  York  journals  of  the  day  furnishes,  in  an 
extract  from  a  Liverpool  letter,  all  the  information  that  we  need, 
as  follows : — 

"The  wheat  market  continues  without  a  symptom  of  revival.  If  your 
supplies  were  to  fall  off  Germany  would  at  once  begin  to  increase  her  con- 
signments to  us.  The  possibility  of  a  rally  in  our  home  prices  is  thus  effec- 
tually prevented,  and  the  year  closes  with  the  price  of  bread  at  a  point  lower 
than  has  been  known  within  modern  experience." 

Germany  and  America  thus  contending  for  the  supply  of  a  dimi- 
nutive market,  prices  are  "lower  than  have  been  known  within  all 
modern  experience,"  and  the  market  presents  no  "symptom  of  re- 
vival." In  this  state  of  things  it  is,  that  we  are  arranging  for 
drawing  from  Europe  hundreds  of  millions  of  dollars  worth  of 
paper,  coal,  and  iron,  to  be  paid  for  by  crowding  on  the  British 
market  all  the  flour  and  all  the  pork  and  beef  now  employed  in 
fabricating  the  first,  and  in  mining  and  converting  the  others ! 
Such  being  the  tendency  of  all  our  present  legislation,  am  I,  my 
dear  sir,  much  in  error  in  asserting  that,  often  as  our  farmers  have 
been  "brayed"  in  the  British  free  trade  "mortar"  their  "foolish- 
ness" has  not  yet  "departed  from  them?" 

All  that  has  thus  far  been  done  towards  increasing  our  depend- 
ence on  the  diminutive  British  market  constitutes,  however,  but  one 
of  the  steps  in. that  direction.  The  repeal  of  the  paper  duty  has 
rendered  necessary  a  movement  towards  the  abolition  of  all  duties 
affecting  the  materials  required  for  the  paper  manufacture.  Of 
these  soda  ash,  of  which  our  consumption  is  probably  40,000  tons, 
is  one  of  the  most  important.  Why  have  we  not  made  it?  Why 
do  we  not  now  make  it?  Why  is  it  that  the  Iowa  farmer  has  been 
using  his  corn  as  fuel  when  there  were  thousands  and  tens  of  thou- 
sands of  European  men  who  would  gladly  have  come  and  eaten  it 
while  engaged  in  converting  into  soda  ash  the  coal,  the  lime, 
and  the  salt  that  underlie  so  much  of  the  land  of  the  Mississippi 
Valley  ?  Because  the  country  gives  to  the  capitalist  no  security 
that  he  shall  not  be  crushed  out  of  existence  after  having  expended 
hundreds  of  thousands  of  dollars  in  the  erection  of  works  required 
for  the  conversion  of  raw  materials  into  the  commodity  we  so 


19 

greatly  need  I  In  the  absence  of  such  security,  and  in  the  presence 
of  agitation  such  as  has  now  succeeded,  so  far  as  your  House,  my 
dear  sir,  is  concerned,  in  crushing  out  one  of  the  greatest  and  most 
fundamental  of  our  industries,  we  shall  be  required  to  continue  year 
after  year  to  give  to  our  masters,  the  "wealthy  capitalists"  of  Eng- 
land, corn  in  its  natural  state  at  a  few  cents  per  bushel,  buying  it 
then  back  again  in  the  form  of  bleaching  powders  at  pence  per 
pound — thus  giving  the  skin  for  sixpence,  and  repurchasing  the 
tail  for  a  shilling. 

It  being  required  of  us  that  we  now  abandon  the  protective 
system,  and  look  once  more  to  Europe  for  that  great  market  which, 
as  we  were  assured  in  1847,  was  before  this  time  to  take  from  us 
" breadstuff's"  to  the  annual  amount  of  hundreds  of  millions,  it  may 
be  well  here  to  inquire  what  it  is  that  that  system  has  done  for  our 
farmers  in  the  short  period  that  has  elapsed  since  the  abdication  of 
Southern  masters  gave  to  the  North  once  more  the  power  of  self- 
protection. 

The  total  export  from  the  port  of  New  York,  exclusive  of  specie, 
in  the  week  ending  January  24,.  is  given  by  the  Evening  Post  at 
$6,333,663.  Of  this  there  appears  to  have  been  of  breadstuff's  and 
provisions  going  to  those  European  markets  from  which  we  are 
likely  henceforth  to  be  obliged  to  draw  our  paper  and  our  iron,  as 
follows : — 

Beef 500  tierces. 

Flour 110  barrels. 

Bacon        ........    49,228  pounds. 

In  the  same  week  the  exports  from  Boston  amounted  to  $481,447, 
in  which  were  included  151  tubs  of  butter  for  Liverpool.  Of  an 
export,  from  those  two  ports,  of  nearly  seven  millions,  the  whole 
amount  of  breadstuff's  and  provisions  for  Europe  did  not  exceed 
$30,000,  or  less  than  one-half  of  one  per  cent.  How  the  remainder 
of  the  vast  sum  was  made  up  will  be  seen  on  an  examination  of  the 
following  list  of  exports  to  the  Argentine  Republic,  which  presents 
a  very  fair  specimen  of  the  whole,  as  given  iu  the  Shipping  List : — 


20 


Sewing  Machines  . 

cases 

142 

Drugs 

Hoop  Skirts  .         . 

. 

21 

Glassware 

Furniture 

.        . 

280 

Hardware 

Clocks           .        . 

.        . 

182 

Petroleum 

Manufactured  Tobacco 

.    Ibs. 

17,975 

Wax 

Oars 

.   pcs. 

500 

Naval  Stores 

Oak       . 

. 

235 

Hops 

Varnish         .         . 

bbls. 

26 

Woodeuware 

Spirits  Tar    . 

galls. 

50 

Pepper 

Shoe  Pegs     . 

bbls. 

55 

Cloves 

Nails     . 

kegs 

306 

Lumber   . 

Perfumery    . 

cases 

75 

pkgs.  185 

cases  81 

pkgs.  438 

galls.  3,158 

bbls.  10 

pkgs.  29 

bales  38 

pkgs.  126 

bags  496 

bales  100 

feet  470,896 


These  articles,  ray  dear  sir,  are  merely  the  food  of  the  laborer  in 
another  and  higher  form  ;  and  thus  it  is  that,  to  the  weekly  extent  of 
millions  of  dollars,  our  farmers  are  enabled,  by  means  of  a  diversified 
industry,  to  relieve  themselves  from  the  necessity  for  forcing  their 
products  on  the  already  glutted  market  of  England.  The  total 
export  of  breadstuffs  to  Great  Britain  and  Ireland,  in  the  last  five 
months,  as  given  in  a  table  now  before  me,  has  been  as  follows : — 

Flour 59,998  barrels. 

Wheat       .         .        .._;».,.        .        .        1,305,183  bushels. 
Corn          .         .        .....       •        •        •  56,933  bushels. 

To  the  Continent  there  have  gone  2,669  barrels  of  flour,  and  68,521 
bushels  of  wheat.  Such  is  the  great  European  market  to  which 
we  are  now  advised  to  look  for  all  our  supplies  of  cloth,  paper,  and 
iron  1  Such  is  the  market  in  whose  favor  we  are  now  required  to 
sacrifice  coal  and  iron  industries  whose  total  products,  in  their  vari- 
ous forms,  now  exceed  four  hundred  millions  of  dollars,  nearly  the 
whole  of  which  vast  sum  goes,  directly  or  indirectly,  to  the  men 
who  are  employed  in  clearing  the  land  or  cultivating  it ! 

Why,  however,  is  it  that  so  little  food  can  be  spared  for  Europe? 
Because  the  domestic  market  has  already  become  so  large  (hat 
prices  are  above  the  exportation  standard.  Let  us  go  ahead  in 
the  direction  in  which  for  three  years  past  we  have  been  moving — 
let  us  give  to  the  makers  of  paper  and  the  smelters  of  iron  ore  that 
security  without  which  they  dare  not  enlarge  their  works  or  increase 
their  number — and  the  day  will  not  then  be  far  distant  when  we 
shall  be  importers  of  wheat,  instead  of  exporters  of  it,  making  a 
market  for  all  the  products  of  Canada  and  enabling  our  own  farmers 
and  landholders  to  become  rich  and  independent,  instead  of  being, 
as  in  all  time  past  they  have  been,  the  mere  serfs  of  those  "wealthy 


21 

capitalists"  whose  first  wish  is  that  food  may  become  cheaper,  and 
cloth  and  iron  dearer. 

Forty  years  since,  General  Jackson  asked  of  his  countrymen  the 
important  question,  "  Where  has  the  American  farmer  a  market 
for  his  surplus  products  ?"  In  answer  thereto  he  spoke  as  follows, 
and  nothing  more  accurate  was  ever  written  : — 

"Except  for  cotton,  he  has  neither  a  foreign  nor  a  home  market. 
Does  not  this  clearly  prove,  when  there  is  no  market  either  at  home 
or  abroad,  that  there  is  too  much  labor  employed  in  agriculture, 
and  that  the  channels  of  labor  should  be  multiplied  ?  Common 
sense  points  out  at  once  the  remedy.  Draw  from  agriculture  the 
superabundant  labor,  employ  it  in  mechanism  and  manufactures, 
thereby  creating  a  home  market  for  your  breadstuffs,  and  distributing 
labor  to  a  most  profitable  account,  and  benefits  to  the  country  will 
result.  TAKE  FROM  AGRICULTURE  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES  six 

HUNDRED  THOUSAND  MEN,  WOMEN,  AND  CHILDREN,  AND  YOU  AT 
ONCE  GIVE  A  HOME  MARKET  FOR  MORE  BREADSTUFFS  THAN  ALL 

EUROPE  NOW  FURNISHES  us.  In  short,  sir,  we  have  been  too  long 
subject  to  the  policy  of  the  British  merchants.  It  is  time  we  should 
become  a  little  more  Americanized,  and,  instead  of  feeding  the 
paupers  and  laborers  of  Europe,  feed  our  own,  or  else  in  a  short 
time,  by  continuing  our  present  policy,  we  shall  all  be  paupers  our- 
selves." 

France  and  England  have  pursued  the  policy  here  recommended, 
and  they*  are  now  the  greatest  exporters  of  food  in  the  world,  the 
annual  amount,  with  each,  counting  by  hundreds  of  millions  of  dol- 
lars. They,  however,  combine  hundred-weights  of  food  with  pounds 
of  wool,  silk,  and  cotton,  and  thus  enable  the  former  readily  to 
make  its  way  throughout  the  outside  world.  We  are  now,  in  pro- 
portion to  our  numbers  and  resources,  the  smallest  food  exporters 
of  the  world,  because  we  insist  on  sending  the  raw  materials  of 
cloth  to  be  combined  together  in  other  and  wiser  countries. 

The  policy  recommended  by  General  Jackson  was  that  of  the 
protective  period  from  1828  to  1834,  at  the  close  of  which  we  paid 
off  the  last  remnant  of  our  national  debt.  It  was  that  of  the 
period  from  1842  to  1847,  which  commenced  with  a  scene  of  almost 
universal  ruin,  and  closed  with  an  exhibit  of  prosperity  such  as  the 
world  had  never  before  seen.  It  is  the  policy  by  means  of  which 
our  farmers  are  now  relieved  from  all  necessity  for  forcing  their 
products  on  foreign  markets,  to  be  there  taken,  at  prices  to  be  fixed 
by  themselves,  by  "wealthy  capitalists,"  who  pay  for  them  in  cloth 
and  iron,  at  prices  also  fixed  by  themselves. 


22 

For  a  portion  of  this  relief  they  have  been  indebted  to  the  demand 
created  by  large  bodies  of  men  employed  in  carrying  muskets,  but 
this  is  so  far  from  being  opposed  to  the  view  above  presented  that  it 
furnishes  proof  conclusive  of  its  truth.  Change  those  men  into 
miners  and  puddlers,  producers  of  silks  and  cottons,  watches  and 
locomotives,  and  their  demands  for  the  various  products  of  the  earth 
will  be  greater  than  now  they  are.  As  it  is,  the  farmer  profits  only 
by  an  increase  in  the  prices  of  what  he  has  to  sell.  As  it  then 
would  be,  he  would  add  thereto  a  decrease  of  price  in  regard  to  all 
that  he  required  to  purchase.  The  truth  of  the  Jacksonian  doctrine 
is,  thus,  thoroughly  demonstrated  by  the  facts  now  presented  in  the 
consumption  of  our  fleets  and  armies.  As  human  pursuits  become 
diversified  land  acquires  value  and  the  farmer  becomes  rich  and  in- 
dependent. 

Who,  now,  are  the  men  who  have  combined  together  for  the 
destruction  of  the  great  paper,  coal,  and  iron  industries,  and  for  the 
reduction  of  the  farmer  to  his  former  dependence  on  British  mar- 
kets ?  Let  us  see.  They  are — 

I.  Railroad  owners,  who,  in  the  last  three  years,  have  taxed  the 
farmer  to  the  utmost  of  their  ability  by  increasing  the  charge  for 
transportation : 

II.  British  agents  who  look  to  reduction  in  the  price  of  food  and 
augmentation  in  the  price  of  iron  for  increase  of  their  commissions: 

III.  Secessionists  at  home  and  abroad,  in  and  out  of  Congress — 
men  who  look  to  bankruptcy  of  the  National  Treasury  as  the  most 
certain  means  of  obtaining  elevation  for  themselves. 

Against  these  should  now  be  banded  together — 

I.  Every  farmer  who  desires  to  see  the  tax  of  transportation 
diminished  and  the  value  of  his  land  increased  : 

II.  Every  laborer  who  desires  to  find  himself  in  the  condition  of 
one  of  the  owners  of  the  land  : 

III.  Every  landholder  who  sees  in  liberal  reward  of  labor  a 
stimulus  to  that  immigration  by  means  of  which  the  number  of  pur- 
chasers of  land  must  be  increased  : 

IV.  Every  man  who  sees  that  land  increases  rapidly  in  value  as  in- 
dustry becomes  more  and  more  diversified,  while  declining  as  rapidly 
when  furnaces  and  mills  are  closed  and  diversification  dies  away: 

Y.  Every  holder  of  a  Government  note,  or  bond,  who  sees  that 
it  is  the  Internal  Revenue  alone  to  which  he  and  others  like  himself 
must  in  future  look  for  payment  of  their  interest : 


23 

VI.  Every  lover  of'his  country  who  sees  that  with  every  increase 
in  the  domestic  commerce  there  is  an  increase  in  the  number  of  the 
threads  by  means  of  which  the  Union  is  to  be  held  together : 

VII.  Every  man  who  appreciates  the  fact  that  it  is  to  that  British 
free  trade  by  means  of  which  we  have  been  compelled  to  look  to  a 
distant  market  as  the  one  in  which  to  make  all  our  exchanges,  that 
we  have  been  indebted  for  the  loss  of  property  and  of  life  that  has 
resulted  from  the  great  rebellfon  ;  and, 

VIII.  Every  man  who  feels  as  an  American  should  feel  in  refer- 
ence to  the  conduct,  throughout  the  past  four  years,  of  that  British 
people  which  teaches  everywhere  "free  trade"  as  the  most  efficient 
means  of  securing  a  monopoly  of  the  machinery  of  transportation 
and  conversion  for  the  world  at  large. 

If  this  nation  is  ever  to  become  really  independent ;  if  it  is  ever 
to  become  Americanized;  if  it  is  ever  to  occupy  that  position  in 
the  world  to  which  the  vast  amount  of  mineral  wealth  placed  at  its 
command  so  well  entitles  it;  if  it  is  ever  to  cease  to  be  a  mere  puppet 
in  the  hands  of  foreign  agents  ;  if  it  is  ever  to  be  placed  in  a  posi- 
tion to  perform  the  duties  of  its  great  mission  to  the  poor  and 
oppressed  throughout  the  earth  ;  its  people  must  learn  that  in  the 
real  and  permanent  interests  of  all  the  portions  of  society  there  is 
a  perfect  harmony,  and  that  of  all  who  should  desire  the  establish- 
ment of  that  certain  protection  which  shall  authorize  the  capitalist 
to  open  mines,  build  furnaces,  improve  water-powers,  and  erect  mills, 
there  are  none  whose  interests  look  so  much  in  that  direction  as  do 
those  of  the  landowner  and  the  fanner.  All,  however,  are  greatly 
interested ;  all  should  learn  to  appreciate  the  advantages  that  must 
result  from  combination  for  relief  from  that  foreign  domination 
under  which  we  have  so  long  and  so  severely  suffered  ;  and  all 
should  study  the  admirable  lesson  taught  in  the  following  fable  by 
our  old  friend  JBsop  : — 

"An  old  man  had  many  sons,  who  were  often  falling  out  with 
one  another.  When  the  father  had  exerted  his  authority,  and  used 
other  means  in  order  to  reconcile  them,  and  all  to  no  purpose,  at 
last  he  had  recourse  to  this  expedient :  he  ordered  his  sons  to  be 
called  before  him,  and  a  short  bundle  of  sticks  to  be  brought;  and 
then  commanded  them,  one  by  one,  to  try  if,  with  all  their  might 
and  strength,  they  could  any  of  them  break  it.  They  all  tried,  but 
to  no  purpose;  for  the  sticks  being  closely  and  compactly  bound  up 
together,  it  was  impossible  for  the  force  of  man  to  do  it.  After 
this,  the  father  ordered  the  bundle  to  be  untied,  and  gave  a  single 


24 

stick  to  each  of  his  sous,  at  the  same  time  bidding  him  try  to  break  it ; 
which,  when  each  did  with  all  imaginable  ease,  the  father  addressed 
himself  to  them  to  this  effect:  '0  my  sons,  behold  the  power  of 
unity!  for  if  you,  in  like  manner,  would  but  keep  yourselves  strictly 
conjoined  in  the  bonds  of  friendship,  it  would  not  be  in  the  power 
of  any  mortal  to  hurt  you ;  but  when  once  the  ties  of  brotherly 
affection  are  dissolved,  how  soon  do  you  fall  to  pieces,  and  are  liable 
to  be  violated  by  every  injurious  hand  that  assaults  you !'  " 

The  men  of  the  North  have  shown  their  appreciation  of  this 
lesson  by  the  determination  they  have  manifested  to  maintain  the 
Union  of  the  States.  Let  the  people  of  all  those  States  show  their 
appreciation  of  it  by  combining  together  for  securing  permanently 
to  the  farmer  such  a  market  for  his  products  as  shall  free  him  wholly 
from  the  tyranny  of  the  "wealthy  capitalists"  abroad;  let  them 
determine  that  American  food  shall  go  to  the  production  of  all  the 
cloth,  all  the  paper,  and  all  the  iron  they  need  to  use,  and  we  shall 
then  have  discovered  the  true  and  certain  mode  of  outdoing  England 
without  fighting  her. 

In  another  letter  I  propose  to  examine  the  railroad  question, 
remaining  meanwhile,  with  great  regard  and  respect, 


Yours,  very  truly, 

HENRY  C.  CAREY. 


Hon.  SCHUYLER  COLFAX. 
PHILADELPHIA,  Jan.  30,  1865. 


THE  RAILROAD  QUESTION. 


DEAR  SIR  : — 

THE  man  who  habitually  retains  himself  in  a  position  to  be 
obliged  to  seek  for  purchasers  of  his  labor  or  its  products  rarely 
fails  to  reap  ruin  as  its  result.  He  who,  on  the  contrary,  so  places 
himself  as  to  be  enabled  to  compel  purchasers  to  come  to  him,  finds 
his  power  of  accumulation  increase  with  each  succeeding  year,  and 
ends  with  colossal  fortune.  The  first  is  that  one  in  which  the 
American  people,  guided  by  British  agents,  have  always  kept  them- 
selves, and  we  have  the  result  in  a  war  that  must  have  brought 
universal  ruin  had  it  not  brought  with  it  also  emancipation  from 
that  British  free  trade  policy  whose  effects  are  so  well  described  by 
General  Jackson  in  the  admirable  letter  already  given.  The  second 
is  that  in  which  the  people  of  France,  under  a  system  of  protection 
maintained  with  a  persistence  that  has  no  parallel  in  history,  have 
placed  themselves.  The  whole  world  is  compelled  to  go  to  them  to 
buy,  and  they  fix  the  prices  at  which  they  choose  to  sell.  The  world 
is  compelled  to  go  there  to  sell,  and  they  are  thus  enabled  to  fix  the 
prices  at  which  they  choose  to  purchase.  The  result  exhibits  itself 
in  a  most  extraordinary  increase  in  the  value  of  lands  and  houses, 
the  figures  of  which  I  have  seen  but  cannot  at  the  moment  find. 
Well,  however,  do  I  recollect  that  they  were  of  a  character  calcu- 
lated to  excite  astonishment  even  in  one  who  had  witnessed  the 
effect  on  western  lauds  of  a  steady  flow  of  emigration  from  the 
East. 

The  first  has  been  governed  by  that  class  of  men  of  which  Mr. 
Secretary  Walker  is  the  type  ;  that  class  which  proclaims  that  this 
is  naturally  "an  agricultural  country,"  and  that  we  must  seek 
abroad  a  market  for  our  "br.eadstuffs  and  provisions" — thereby 
so  limiting  o  .r  people  in  their  modes  of  employment  as  to  make 
the  country  little  more  than  a  mere  puppet  in  the  hands  of  foreign 
traders.  The  other  has  been,  in  this  respect  at  least,  governed  by 
1 


2 

men  of  whom  the  great  Colbert  is  the  type — men  who  have  clearly 
seen  that  national  independence  was  to  be  achieved  by  means  of 
bringing  the  consumer  to  take  his  place  by  the  side  of  the  producer, 
and  thereby  giving  value  to  both  land  and  labor.  The  results  ex- 
hibit themselves  in  the  fact  that  Prance  now  controls  the  move- 
ments of  all  Europe,  while  the  people  of  this  country,  with  natural 
advantages  a  thousandfold  greater,  and  almost  as  large  a  popula- 
tion, now  find  themselves  compelled  to  abandon  the  Monroe  doctrine 
and  fight  for  national  existence — France,  meanwhile,  obtaining 
command  of  our  immediate  neighbor,  Mexico. 

Shall  we  ever  do  better  ?  It  may  well  be  doubted.  Often  as  our 
farmers,  our  merchants,  and  our  transporters  have  been  "brayed" 
in  the  British  free  trade  "  mortar,"  their  "  foolishness"  has  not  yet 
"departed  from  them;"  and,  judging  from  recent  proceedings  in 
Congress,  it  would  seem  that,  sad  as  has  been  our  experience,  they 
are  little  likely  even  now  to  profit  by  it.  Nothing,  as  it  would 
seem,  can  open  their  eyes  to  a  perception  of  the  great  fact,  that  in 
the  real  and  permanent  interests  of  the  West  and  the  East,  the 
North  and  the  South,  as  well  as  in  those  of  the  ship-owner,  the  rail- 
road proprietor,  the  miner,  the  iron-master,  the  land-owner,  and  the 
laborer,  there  is  a  perfect  harmony,  and  that  it  is  absolutely  im- 
possible to  injure  any  one  of  them  without  at  the  same  time  injuriously 
affecting  all  the  rest.  Blind  to  this  are  they  all,  and,  as  a  conse- 
quence of  this  it  is,  that  we  find  western  land-holders  and  laborers 
combining  with  railroad  managers  for  promoting  the  adoption  of  a 
policy  that  each  and  every  one  of  them  would  bitterly  denounce 
could  he  but  be  persuaded  to  pause  a  little  in  his  course  and  study 
carefully  what  had  been  the  effect  in  the  past  of  measures  similar 
to  those  whose  adoption  he  now  so  earnestly  advocates. 

Of  all,  there  are  none  who  have  shown  themselves  so  blind  to 
their  true  interests  as  those  same  railroad  managers.  All  experience 
teaches  that  roads  are  profitable  in  the  ratio  borne  by  way  to  through 
business,  and  unprofitable  in  the  ratio  borne  by  through  to  way  busi- 
ness. Why  is  it  so  ?  Because  with  the  growth  of  this  latter  they 
become  independent ;  whereas,  with  increase  in  the  proportion  borne 
by  through  business  they  become  more  and  more  dependent.  In 
proof  of  this  we  may  take  the  fact,  that  such  has  been  the  compe- 
tition for  this  latter  that  produce  has,  on  many  occasions,  been 
forwarded  from  Chicago  to  New  York  more  cheaply  than  from 
Buffalo,  and  more  cheaply  from  this  latter  than  from  either  Roches- 


ter  or  Syracuse.  In  this  manner  they  first  offer  bounties  on  emigra- 
tion from  the  older  States,  and  then  find  themselves  compelled  to 
enlarge  their  capital  and  extend  their  roads  with  a  view  to  retain 
their  business.  Common  sense  might,  as  one  would  think,  teach  them 
that  by  aiding  in  the  development  of  our  great  mineral  resources 
they  would  be  creating  a  local  traffic  that  could  be  carried  on  at 
small  cost  and  with  great  profit  to  themselves  ;  yet  have  they  in- 
variably been  found  combining  .with  British  agents  in  opposition  to 
such  development,  thereby  imposing  upon  themselves  a  necessity  for 
still  further  extension  of  their  lines,  with  steady  diminution  in  their 
power  to  pay  their  stockholders. 

Our  railroad  history  covers  a  period  of  only  five  and  thirty  years, 
and  it  may  now  be  not  unprofitable  to  cast  our  eyes  back  over  that 
period  with  a  view  to  ascertain  what  are  the  lessons  for  the  future 
that  may  be  thence  deduced. 

In  1832,  the  railroad  interest  insisted  upon  depriving  our  furnaces 
of  the  manufacture  of  railroad  bars.  In  the  ten  succeeding  years 
many  roads  were  made,  and  all  with  British  bars  bought  at  the 
highest  prices.  As  a  consequence  the  cost  of  roads  was  great,  and 
at  the  close  of  the  free  trade  period  in  1842  the  railroad  interest 
was  in  a  state  of  almost  universal  ruin.  Why  was  it  so  ?  Because 
the  road-makers  had  united  with  British  traders  in  urging  upon  the 
country  a  policy  whose  effect  had  been  that  of  making  them  yearly 
more  and  more  dependent  upon  a  through  trade  that  could  not  be 
made  to  yield  a  profit.  The  domestic  market  for  food  had  been 
greatly  lessened,  while  that  of  Europe  had  failed  to  grow. 

The  tariff  of  1842  imposed  a  heavy  duty  on  railroad  bars,  and 
then  for  the  first  time  was  their  manufacture  commenced  on  this 
side  of  the  Atlantic.  Iron  generally  being  well  protected  the  pro- 
duction rose  in  half  a  dozen  years  to  800,000  tons,  and  the  con- 
sumption to  900,000.  Labor  being  everywhere  in  demand,  im- 
migration trebled  in  that  brief  period.  Towns  and  villages  increased 
in  number  and  in  size.  The  local  traffic  therefore  grew,  and  railroads 
became  once  more  profitable  to  their  proprietors. 

Taking  no  lesson  from  experience  railroad  and  canal  owners 
united  in  beating  down  protection,  and  giving  us  Mr.  Walker's 
free  trade  tariff  of  1846.  How  they  profited  of  this  may  be  judged 
from  the  following  figures  giving  the  receipts  of  some  of  the  princi- 
pal works  in  the  period  from  1842  to  1849  : — 


New  Tork 

Bait,  and  Ohio 

Pennsylvania 

rp-i-i 

canals. 

railroad. 

canals. 

i  oiai. 

1842, 

1,749,000 

426,000 

903,000 

3,078,000 

1844, 

2,446,000 

658,000 

1,164,000 

4,268,000 

1846, 

2,756,000 

881,000 

1,357,000 

4,994,000 

1847, 

3,635,000 

1,101,000 

1,587,000 

6,323,000 

1848, 

3,252,000 

1,231,000 

1,550,000 

6,033,000 

1849, 

3,266,000 

1,241,000 

1,580,000 

6,087,000 

Under  protection  the  receipts  more  than  doubled,  as  here  is  shown. 
As  the  British  free  trade  system  became  more  fully  operative  they 
declined,  thus  presenting  a  striking  commentary  on  Mr.  Walker's 
assertion,  made  but  two  years  previously,  that  under  a  free  trade 
system  "  our  own  country,  with  its  pre-eminent  advantages,  would 
measure  its  annual  trade  in  imports  and  exports  by  thousands  of 
millions  of  dollars." 

At  that  moment,  however,  California  had  already  begun  to  fur- 
nish to  the  world  its  golden  treasures,  thus  making  a  market  for 
labor  under  which  immigration  for  several  years  rapidly  increased. 
That  period,  however,  terminated  with  1854,  and  thenceforward 
railroad  property,  as  a  natural  consequence  of  continued  railroad 
agitation  for  the  abolition  of  the  duty  on  railroad  iron,  rapidly 
decreased  in  value,  as  is  shown  by  the  following  figures  :  — 


1852-3. 

1855. 

Baltimore  and  Ohio     . 

98 

56 

Boston  and  Worcester 

.       105 

87J 

New  York  and  Erie 

85 

52 

Cleveland  and  Pittsburg     . 

93 

70 

118 

97 

Cincinnati  and  Dayton        .         . 

.       102 

85 

Pennsylvania  Central          . 

93 

88 

Camden  and  Amboy    . 

.      149 

128 

Boston  and  Maine 

.       102 

94 

From  that  date  to  the  opening  of  the  rebellion  immigration  de- 
clined ;  internal  development  almost  ceased  ;  and  railroad  property 
so  much  depreciated  that  the  average  value  of  the  New  York  Cen- 
tral, Erie,  Hudson  River,  Reading,  Michigan  Central,  Michigan 
Southern,  Rhode  Island,  Cleveland  and  Toledo,  Illinois  Central, 
and  Galena  and  Ohio  roads  was  only  forty  -two  per  cent. 

The  war  came,  bringing  with  it  protection  to  the  farmer,  accom- 
panied by  an  increase  in  the  value  of  railroad  property,  as  exhi- 
bited in  the  following  figures  giving  the  average  prices  of  the  several 
roads  last  above  referred  to  :  — 


January,  1855  1860  1862  1863  1864 

42  56  51  95  143 

Seeking  now  the  cause  of  the  vast  change  that  is  here  exhibited 
we  find  it  in  the  following  passages  from  Reports  just  made  by  two 
important  Western  roads — the  Southern  Michigan  and  the  Cleve- 
land and  Pittsburg  Railroad. 

From  the  first  we  learn  that — 

"  Although  the  decline  on  the  through  business  is  at  the  rate  of 
$30,000  to  $40,000  per  month,  so  great  has  been  the  increase  in 
local  traffic  that  the  aggregate  earnings  for  January,  1 865,  show  an 
increase  of  about  $50,000  over  the  corresponding  month  last  year. 
Although  there  has  been  no  diminution  in  the  number  of  employees, 
the  aggregate  number  of  miles  run  by  passenger  trains  is  now  5000 
per  week  less  than  it  was  before  the  issuing  of  the  passport  order. 
There  is,  therefore,  a  considerable  saving  in  running  expenses." 

And  from  the  second  that — 

"The  great  increase  of  freight  upon  the  road  has  come  in  a  very 
important  degree  from  two  articles  of  traffic  which  may  be  considered 
the  staple  of  your  road,  naturally  and  legitimately  belonging  to  it. 
These  articles  are  coal  and  iron  ore  of  Lake  Superior.  The  coal 
interest  was  one  of  the  principal  agencies  in  planning  and  building 
this  road,  and  those  early  projectors  of  the  enterprise  have  always 
looked  to  the  development  of -the  coal  mines  on  the  line  of  the  road 
as  a  sure  and  steady  means  of  remuneration.  The  coal  trade  has 
from  the  first  held  an  important  place  among  the  various  sources  of 
revenue  to  your  road.  It  has  steadily  increased  with  the  progress 
of  years,  and  as  manufacturing  has  been  more  extensively  under- 
taken, and  as  new  demands  for  coal  from  regions  before  unsupplied 
have  arisen,  the  transportation  over  your  road  has  been  greatly 
increased  in  amount." 

What  is  true  of  these  two  roads,  is  almost  equally  so  of  those  of 
the  country  at  large,  the  existing  prosperity  of  the  whole  railroad 
interest  having  come  as  a  natural  consequence  of  great  develop- 
ments of  mineral  wealth.  Take,  for  instance,  petroleum,  of  which 
to  the  extent  of  $46,000,000  was  sent  to  market  in  the  past  year, 
and  see,  my  dear  sir,  how  large  have  already  become  its  contribu- 
tions to  railroad  revenues.  Look  further,  however,  and  see  how 
enormous  they  must  become  when  Ohio,  Virginia,  and  other  States 
shall  have  sunk  their  wells  and  erected  their  engines,  and  when  refin- 
eries shall,  at  the  place  of  production,  fit  it  for  cheap  transportation 
to  the  remotest  corners  of  Maine  in  the  Northeast  and  Texas  in  the 
Southwest,  Florida  in  the  Southeast  and  Nevada  in  the  Northwest; 


6 

and  then  endeavor  to  satisfy  yourself  to  what  extent  it  is  that  every 
road  in  the  country  is  interested  in  the  successful  prosecution  of  the 
great  work  of  development  that  has  but  now  commenced.  Take 
next  the  13,000,000  tons  of  coal  now  mined,  and  follow  them  in 
their  travels  throughout  the  Union,  paying  toll  directly  to  roads  in 
the  East  and  roads  in  the  West,  and  indirectly  to  every  one  in  the 
whole  extent  of  the  loyal  States.  Add  now  to  them  the  1,300,000 
tons  of.  pig  metal  at  present  made,  and  follow  them,  in  all  their 
various  forms  of  railroad  bars,  stoves,  pipes,  knives,  and  engines, 
and  then  determine  to  what  extent  they  have  contributed  to  give  to 
the  roads  of  the  country  their  present  value. 

Study  next,  I  pray  you,  the  perfect  harmony  of  all  these  various 
interests,  and  satisfy  yourself  how  shortsighted  are  the  men  who 
believe  in  national  discords.  What  is  it  that  has  so  suddenly  given 
an  almost  fabulous  value  to  the  great  oil  region  of  the  West  ?  Is 
it  not  the  almost  immediate  presence  of  the  great  machine-shops 
of  Ohio,  Indiana,  Illinois,  and  Pennsylvania?  What  would  be  its 
value  were  its  owners  obliged  to  seek  in  Birmingham  for  engines  ? 
It  would  have  none  whatsoever.  To  whom,  however,  are  we  in- 
debted for  those  shops  ?  Is  it  not  to  men  who  have  sunk  mines 
and  built  furnaces,  others  who  have  mined  coal  and  ore,  and  still 
others  who  have  converted  raw  material  into  pigs  and  pipes? 
That  it  is  so,  cannot  be  questioned.  The  harmony  of  all  those 
interests  is  absolute  and  complete. 

Equally  so  is  that  which  exists  between  the  men  who  make  and 
those  who  need  to  purchase  the  railroad  bar.  Many  millions  of 
dollars  worth  of  oil  go  to  market,  there  to  be  exchanged  for  sugar 
and  coffee,  cloth,  iron,  and  the  thousand  other  commodities  needed 
for  a  population  that  is  increasing  in  wealth  and  numbers,  and  at 
every  stage  of  their  progress  they  contribute  towards  railroad  divi- 
dends. So,  too,  with  the  iron  and  the  coal.  I  have  now  before  me 
the  accounts  of  a  single  iron  establishment  that  paid  last  year,  in 
railroad  tolls,  no  less  a  sum  than  $200,000.  Judging  from  this, 
at  how  many  millions  might  we  safely  fix  the  contributions  of  coal 
and  iron  to  the  maintenance  of  the  railroad  interest? 

To  enable  us  to  form  an  accurate  judgment  of  the  amount  of 
such  contributions  by  the  great  fundamental  industries,  let-  us  for 
a  moment  look  to  the  effect  that  would  at  once  result  from 
their  annihilation.  Would  it  not  certainly  diminish  by  two-thirds 
the  real  value  of  every  railroad  in  the  Union?  That  it  would 


do  so,  cannot  be  questioned.  What,  then,  would  be  the  effect  were 
we  in  the  next  seven  years  to  double,  even  if  we  should  not  treble, 
the  product  of  our  mines,  our  furnaces,  our  rolling-mills,  and  our 
wells?  Could  it  fail  to  be  that  of  giving  to  all  railroad  property 
a  fixed  and  certain  value,  even  when  estimated  in  gold,  greater  than 
it  ever  yet  has  known?  That  it  could  not  fail  to  do  so,  is  abso- 
lutely certain.  That  you  may  now  be  led,  my  dear  sir,  to  arrive,  in 
this  respect,  at  the  same  belief  with  myself,  I  would  ask  you  to  look 
to  the  fact  that  a  coal  mine  is  a  vast  magazine  of  power;  that  thou- 
sands of  tons  of  coal  can  be  made  to  do  the  work  of  hundreds  of 
thousands  of  men ;  that  in  the  extent  and  variety  of  metallic  de- 
posits we  are  ahead  of  the  whole  of  Europe  combined;  that  POWER 
ALONE  is  needed  for  bringing  to  light  the  vast  treasures  of  the  iron 
mountains  of  Missouri  on  the  west,  and  of  the  Adirondack  on  the 
east — of  the  great  iron  and  copper  beds  of  the  shores  of  Lake  Su- 
perior— of  the  wealth-abounding  hills  of  Tennessee — of  the  great 
lead  deposits  of  Illinois  and  Iowa — of  the  coal,  iron,  and  gold 
abounding  districts  of  Virginia — of  the  zinc  and  iron  deposits  of 
New  Jersey — and  of  the  granite  hills  of  New  England ;  that  the 
power  at  our  command  is  equal  to  that  of  almost  the  whole  earth 
combined ;  that  that  now  used  in  Great  Britain  alone  is  estimated 
as  beirig  equal  to  the  labor  of  600,000,000  of  men ;  that  by  a  proper 
application  of  our  energies  we  might  within  the  next  decade  go  far 
beyond  even  that  vast  amount ;  that  production  increases  almost 
geometrically  as  the  power  applied  increases  arithmetically ;  that 
exchanges  increase  with  the  increase  of  production ;  that  the  power 
to  contribute  to  the  maintenance  of  roads  increases  with  a  rapidity 
far  exceeding  that  of  production  ;  and  then  determine  for  yourself 
how  magnificent  is  the  future  that  will  open  itself  to  the  eye  of 
every  railroad  manager  when  he  and  his  fellow-proprietors  shall 
have  arrived  at  the  conclusion,  that  there  is  a  perfect  harmony  in 
the  interests  of  the  men  who  make  iron  and  those  who  need  to  use 
it,  and  that  an  enlightened  self-interest  demands  of  them  that  they 
shall  ask  of  Congress  the  establishment  of  such  a  revenue  system  as 
shall  give  to  the  capitalist  that  certainty  in  regard  to  the  future 
which  is  needed  for  enabling  us,  before  the  lapse  of  another  decade, 
to  place  ourselves  side  by  side  with  Great  Britain  in  the  production 
of  many  of  the  most  important  metals,  and  before  the  close  of 
another  to  leave  her  far  behind,  thus  giving  to  the  farmer  a  market 
near  at  hand  for  all  his  products. 


The  mind  is  lost  in  contemplation  of  the  marvellous  amount  of 
wealth  and  power  that  has  by  a  beneficent  Creator  been  placed  at 
our  command.  Still  more,  however,  is  it  lost  in  wonder  when 
studying  the  slow  degrees  by  which  we  have  arrived  at  the  idea  that 
prosperity  among  our  people,  freedom  to  the  slave,  and  power  and 
influence  among  the  nations  of  the  world,  were  to  come  to  us  only 
as  a  consequence  of  the  application  of  that  vast  power  to  the  de- 
velopment of  that  wonderful  wealth.  More  than  thirty  years  since, 
at  the  close  of  the  protective  period  which  began  in  1828,  our  con- 
sumption of  iron  was  300,000  tons.  Ten  years  later,  at  the  close 
of  a  long  and  dreary  free-trade  period,  with  a  population  one-third 
greater,  the  consumption  was  still  but  little  more.  Five  years 
later,  at  the  close  of  the  protective  period  of  1842,  our  production 
had  already  trebled,  and  so  great  had  become  the  demand,  that  the 
import  of  foreign  iron  was  nearly  as  great  as  it  had  been  in  1842. 
Ten  years  still  later,  with  a  population  again  a  third  increased,  and 
with  all  the  advantage  of  California  gold  developments,  our  pro- 
duction, under  the  British  free-trade  system,  had  diminished,  while 
our  total  consumption  had  scarcely  at  all  increased.  Of  the  four 
years  that  have  since  passed  by,  one  was  a  period  of  universal  pros- 
tration, and  yet,  in  the  three  that  have  succeeded  our  consumption 
has  been  carried  up  to  a  point  nearly  one-third  higher  than  that  at 
which  it  stood  at  the  outbreak  of  the  great  rebellion.  These  are 
remarkable  facts,  and  with  them  is  connected  another  series  of 
phenomena  of  the  highest  importance  to  railroad  proprietors,  which, 
however,  seems  to  have  escaped  their  notice.  Whenever  the  domes- 
tic production  of  iron  has  been  advancing  railroad  property  has 
paid  good  dividends,  while  dividends  have  always  declined  as 
furnaces  and  rolling-mills  became  idle  and  their  proprietors 
became  bankrupt.  In  1832,  the  first  of  the  protective  periods 
above  referred  to,  railroads  had  scarcely  yet  made  their  appearance 
on  the  stage,  but  transporters  of  every  description  were  highly 
prosperous.  In  1842,  at  the  close  of  the  first  of  the  above-named 
free-trade  periods,  furnaces  were  closed  and  railroad  companies  were 
bankrupt.  In  1847,  the  second  protective  period,  ironmasters  were 
prosperous  and  railroad  companies  paid  good  dividends.  In  1854, 
under  a  temporary  California  excitement,  railroad  stocks  were  high 
and  ironmasters  were  building  rolling-mills.  In  1860,  at  the  close 
of  the  last  free-trade  period,  railroad  stocks  were  selling,  as  has 
been  already  shown,  at  an  average  of  42  per  cent.,  and  mills,  mines, 


9 

and  furnaces  were  everywhere  closed.  To-day,  after  three  years  of 
protection,  all  is  changed,  ironmasters  having  doubled  their  pro- 
duction and  thus  enabled  railroad  stocks  to  go  again  to  par. 

The  direct  connection  between  the  road  and  iron  interests  is  here 
so  clearly  obvious  that  it  is  almost  marvellous  that  the  former 
should  so  long  have  failed  to  see  it.  More  wonderful  is  it,  how- 
ever, that  seeing  what  has  but  now  occurred,  they  should  yet  con- 
tinue so  blind  to  their  true  interests  as  to  array  themselves  in  oppo- 
sition to  any  measure  on  the  part  of  Congress  that  shall  tend  to 
give  that  security  for  the  future  without  which  the  capitalist  will 
not  give  his  time  and  his  means  to  the  opening  of  mines,  or  to  the 
building  of  furnaces  and  mills.  To  induce  him  so  to  apply  his 
powers  he  must  have  protection  against  that  system  so  well  described 
in  an  extract  from  a  Parliamentary  Report  to  which  your  attention 
has  already  more  than  once  been  called,  and  which,  as  I  have  said, 
should  be  read  day  by  day,  week  by  week,  month  by  month,  and 
year  by  year,  by  every  man  who  desires  to  see  the  Union  maintained, 
with  constant  increase  in  the  power  of  the  nation  to  command  the 
respect  of  the  other  communities  of  the  earth.  It  is  as  follows : — 

"The  laboring  classes  generally,  in  the  manufacturing  districts  of 
this  country  and  especially  in  the  iron  and  coal  districts,  are  very 
little  aware  of  the  extent  to  which  they  are  often  indebted  for  their 
being  employed  at  all  to  the  immense  losses  which  their  employers 
voluntarily  incur  in  bad  times,  in  order  to  destroy  foreign  competi- 
tion, and  to  gain  and  keep  possession  of  foreign  markets.  Au- 
thentic instances  are  well  known  of  employers  having  in  such  times 
carried  on  their  works  at  a  loss  amounting  in  the  aggregate  to 
three  or  four  hundred  thousand  pounds  in  the  course  of  three  or 
four  years.  If  the  efforts  of  those  who  encourage  the  combinations 
to  restrict  the  amount  of  labor  'and  to  produce  strikes  were  to  be 
successful  for  any  length  of  time,  the  great  accumulations  of  capital 
could  no  longer  be  made  which  enable  a  few  of  the  most  wealthy 
capitalists  to  overwhelm  all  foreign  competition  in  times  of  great 
depression,  and  thus  to  clear  the  way  for  the  whole  trade  to  step 
in  when  prices  revive,  and  to  carry  on  a  great  business  before  foreign 
capital  can  again  accumulate  to  such  an  extent  as  to  be  able  to 
establish  a  competition  in  prices  with  any  chance  of  success.  The 
large  capitalists  of  this  country  are  the  great  instruments  of  warfare 
against  the  competing  capital  of  foreign  countries,  and  are  the  most 
essential  instruments  now  remaining  by  which  our  manufacturing 
supremacy  can  be  maintained  ;  the  other  elements — cheap  labor, 
abundance  of  raw  material,  means  of  communication,  and  skilled 
labor — being  rapidly  in  process  of  being  equalized." 


10 

The  wealthy  British  "capitalists"  here  described  have  their 
agents  everywhere,  and  everywhere  prepared  for  combination  with 
every  little  private  or  local  interest  for  the  removal  of  grievances  of 
which  they  know  their  masters  and  themselves  to  be  the  cause. 
What  they  desire,  as  they  know  full  well,  is  that  food  may  be  cheap 
and  iron  high  in  price.  What  we  desire,  and  what  by  means  of 
protection  we  are  seeking  to  obtain,  is  that  the  farmer  may  from 
year  to  year  be  enabled  to  obtain  more  spades  and  ploughs,  and 
better  means  of  transportation,  in  exchange  for  less  and  less  of  food. 
When,  however,  the  farmer  complains  of  the  low  price  of  corn,  he 
finds  the  agent  always  at  hand,  Mephistophiles-like,  to  whisper  in 
his  ear  that  but  for  protection  spades  and  ploughs  would  be  cheaper, 
while  food  would  command  a  higher  price.  When  the  railroad 
manager  seeks  to  buy  iron,  he  points  to  the  low  price  at  which 
British  iron  might  be  purchased,  wholly  omitting  to  call  the  atten- 
tion of  his  hearer  to  the  facts,  that  British  iron  is  always  cheap 
when  American  people  build  furnaces,  and  when  American  rail- 
road companies  make  good  dividends,  and  always  dear  when  Ame- 
rican furnaces  have  been  blotted  out  of  existence,  when  their 
owners  have  been  made  bankrupt,  and  when  American  railroad 
stocks  are  of  little  worth.  In  proof  of  this,  I  now  give  you  the 
following  facts  as  they  present  themselves  in  the  Reports  on  Com- 
merce and  Navigation  for  the  several  years  above  referred  to  : — 

At  the  close  of  the  protective  period  which  commenced  in  1828 
and  terminated  in  1833 — that  one  in  which  for  the  first  time  the 
iron  manufacture  made  a  great  forward  movement,  and  therefore 
the  most  prosperous  one  that  the  country  had  ever  known,  the 
price  at  which  British  bar  iron,  rails  included,  was  shipped  to  this 
country,  was  forty  dollars. 

Eight  years  later,  in  1841,  when  our  mechanics  were  seeking 
alms — when  our  farmers  could  find  no  market — when  furnaces 
and  mills  were  everywhere  closed,  and  their  owners  everywhere 
ruined — when  States  were  repudiating,  and  the  National  Treasury 
was  wholly  unable  to  meet  its  small  engagements — the  shipping 
price  of  British  bars  had  been  advanced  to  fifty  dollars. 

Eight  years  later,  in  1849,  after  protection  had  carried  up  our 
domestic  product  to  800,000  tons,  and  after  the  British  free  trade 
tariff  of  1846  had  once  again  placed  our  ironmasters  under  the 
heel  of  the  "  wealthy  English  capitalist,"  we  find  the  latter  ener- 
getically using  that  potent  "instrument  of  warfare"  by  means  of 


11 

which  he  "gains  and  keeps  possession  of  foreign  markets,"  and 
supplying  bar  iron  at  THIRTY  DOLLARS  per  ton.  In  what  man- 
ner, however,  was  the  railroad  interest  paying  for  a  redaction 
like  this,  by  means  of  which  they  were  being  enabled  to  save  on 
their  repairs  a  tenth  or  a  twentieth  of  one  per  cent,  on  their  re- 
spective capitals  ?  Seeking  an  answer  to  this  question  I  find  in  the 
Merchant's  Magazine  a  comparison  of  the  prices  in  February,  1848 
and  1 850,  of  thirteen  important  roads,  by  which  it  is  shown  that  in 
that  short  period  there  had  been  a  decline  of  more  than  thirty 
per  cent. !  This  would  seem  to  be  paying  somewhat  dearly  for  the 
whistle  of  cheap  iron  ;  and  yet  it  is  bat  trifling  as  compared  with 
information  contained  in  a  paragraph  which  follows  in  which  are 
given  the  names  of  numerous  important  roads,  whose  cost  had  been 
very  many  millions  of  dollars,  but  which  "  from  prices  quoted,  and 
those  merely  nominal,  seem  to  be  of  little  or  no  value — not  enough, 
nor  one-fourth  enough,  to  pay  interest  on  the  sums  advanced  for 
their  creation." 

At  the  close  of  another  terra  of  similar  length,  say  in  185T,  we 
arrive  at  a  scene  of  ruin  more  general  than  any  that  had  been  wit- 
nessed since  the  closing  years  of  that  British  free  trade  period  which 
terminated  with  the  universal  crash  of  '42.  How  very  low  were 
then  railroad  stocks  has  been  already  shown.  What,  however,  was 
the  price  at  which  British  ironmasters  were  willing,  now  that  they 
had  so  effectually  crushed  out  competition,  to  meet  the  demands 
of  railroad  managers  ?  Were  they  still  willing  to  accept  $30  per 
ton  as  the  shipping  price  ?  Did  they  then  manifest  any  desire  to 
help  the  friends  who  had  so  largely  aided  them  in  "  gaining  and 
keeping  possession"  of  this  American  market  ?  Far  from  it !  The 
more  that  railroad  stocks  went  down,  as  a  consequence  of  failure 
of  the  domestic  commerce,  the  more  determined  did  the  British 
masters  of  our  American  stockholders  show  themselves,  Shylock- 
like,  determined  to  exact  "the  pound  of  flesh."  In  this  unhappy 
period  the  shipping  price  of  bars  was  $48,  and  that  of  railroad  iron 
$42,  the  average  having  been  FORTY-FOUR  DOLLARS,  or  nearly  fifty 
per  cent,  advance  on  the  prices  accepted  in  1849,  when  our  foreign 
lords  and  masters  had  been  engaged  in  "  overwhelming  all  foreign 
competition  in  times  of  great  depression,"  and  thus  "  clearing  the 
way  for  the  whole  trade  to  step  in  when  prices  revived,  and  to 
carry  on  a  great  business  before  foreign  capital  could  again  accu- 


12 

mulate  so  as  to  be  able  to  establish  a  competition  in  prices  with 
any  chance  of  success." 

Twice  thus,  at  intervals  of  eight  years  each,  have  we  had  low 
British  prices  and  great  American  prosperity  as  a  consequence  of 
the  adoption  of  a  policy  under  which  American  competition  for  the 
sale  of  iron  has  largely  grown.  Twice,  at  similar  intervals,  have 
we  had  high  British  prices  and  universal  American  depression  as  a 
consequence  of  the  re-adoption  of  that  system  under  which  we  have 
been  compelled  to  compete  in  a  foreign  market  for  the  purchase,  of 
British  iron.  Twice,  thus,  have  American  railroad  managers  been 
"brayed"  in  the  British  free  trade  "  mortar,"  and  twice  have  Ame- 
rican transporters  found  prosperity  by  aid  of  those  protective 
measures  to  which  they  have  always  shown  themselves  so  much 
opposed.  Their  British  free  trade  experience  had  been  a  somewhat 
sad  one.  Have  they  profited  of  it  ?  Let  us  see. 

Another  eight  year  period  has  now  passed  by,  and  we  reach  the 
present  year  1865,  with  railroad  stocks  selling  for  a  thousand  mil- 
lions of  dollars  that  would  not,  at  its  commencement,  have  sold  for 
five  hundred  millions.  What  has  caused  this  wonderful  change  ? 
The  re-creation,  by  means  of  a  protective  tariff,  of  a  great  internal 
commerce,  and  nothing  else.  Under  that  tariff  mines  have  been 
opened,  mills  and  furnaces  have  been  built,  demand  has  been  created 
for  labor  and  labor's  products,  commerce  has  grown,  and  road 
proprietors  have  participated  with  farmers  in  the  advantages  re- 
sulting from  the  creation  of  a  great  domestic  market  which  are  so 
well  described  in  an  extract  from  the  recent  message  of  Governor 
Yates,  of  Illinois,  already  given,  but  here  reproduced  because  of  its 
important  bearing  on  the  question  now  before  us : — 

"As  a  State,  notwithstanding  the  war,  we  have  prospered  beyond 
all  former  precedents.  Notwithstanding  nearly  two  hundred  thou- 
sand of  the  most  athletic  and  vigorous  of  our  population  have  been 
withdrawn  from  the  field  of  production,  the  area  of  land  now  under 
cultivation  is  greater  than  at  any  former  period,  and  the  census  of 
1865  will  exhibit  an  astonishing  increase  in  every  department  of 
material  industry  and  advancement ;  in  a  great  increase  of  agricul- 
tural, manufacturing,  and  mechanical  wealth  ;  in  new  and  improved 
modes  for  production  of  every  kind ;  in  the  substitution  of  machinery 
for  the  manual  labor  withdrawn  by  the  war ;  in  the  triumphs  of  in- 
vention ;  in  the  wonderful  increase  of  railroad  enterprise ;  in  the 
universal  activity  of  business,  in  all  its  branches;  in  the  rapid  growth 
of  our  cities  and  villages ;  in  the  bountiful  harvests,  and  in  an  un- 
exampled material  prosperity,  prevailing  on  every  hand ;  while,  at 


13 

the  same  time,  the  educational  institutions  of  the  people  have  in  no 
way  declined.  Our  colleges  and  schools,  of  every  class  and  grade, 
are  in  the  most  flourishing  condition  ;  our  benevolent  institutions, 
State  and  private,  are  kept  up  and  maintained  ;  and,  in  a  word,  our 
prosperity  is  as  complete  and  ample  as  though  no  tread  of  armies 
or  beat  of  drum  had  been  heard  in  all  our  borders." 

The  picture  here  given  is  that  of  every  loyal  State  of  the  Union, 
and  yet  it  is  but  the  beginning  of  the  change  that  is  to  be  accom- 
plished by  means  of  the  establishment  of  perfect  commercial  inde- 
pendence. Railroad  proprietors  have  already  profited  of  it  to  the 
extent  of  hundreds  of  millions  of  dollars,  and  they  have  yet  to 
profit  to  the  extent  of  many  other  hundreds  of  millions  by  the 
further  opening  of  mines,  the  further  building  of  mills,  and  the 
further  development  of  the  wonderful  amount  of  mineral  wealth 
placed  by  a  kind  Providence  at  our  command,  and  waiting  only  the 
application  of  that  power  which  now  lies  hidden  beneath  the  soil 
of  so  many  thousands  of  square  miles  of  all  these  central  States. 
So  having  profited  in  the  past,  and  having  in  view  so  large  a  profit 
in  the  future,  it  might  be  supposed  that  they  would  now,  at  least,  be 
content.  Are  they  so  ?  Are  they  disposed  to  let  well  alone  !  Has 
their  "foolishness"  at  length  departed  from  them  ?  Having  been 
now  so  repeatedly  "  brayed"  in  the  free  trade  "  mortar,"  are  they 
now  at  last  awakened  to  a  sense  of  the  advantages  that  must  in- 
evitably result  to  themselves  from  carrying  up  our  production  of  iron 
from  hundreds  of  thousands  to  millions  of  tons  ?  Do  they  see  that, 
to  enable  the  Union  to  hold  together,  we  must  establish  such  an  in- 
ternal commerce  as  will  permit  of  exchanges  being  made  between 
its  various  parts  freed  from  the  intervention  of  British  agents, 
British  ships,  and  British  ports  ?  Are  their  eyes  yet  open  to  a  per- 
ception of  the  fact  that  the  country  that  makes  the  most  iron  is 
the  one  into  whose  hands  must  fall  the  direction  of  the  commerce 
of  the  world?  Have  they,  in  any  manner,  profited  by  the  sad  ex- 
perience of  the  past?  To  all  these  questions  the  reply  must,  un- 
happily, be  a  negative  one.  Like  the  Bourbons,  they  have  learned 
nothing,  and  have  forgotten  none  of  their  free  trade  prejudices,  and 
it  is  much  to  be  feared  they  never  will,  or  can,  do  so.  Despite  all 
the  lessons  of  the  past  they  have  now  allied  themselves  with  British 
agents  for  crashing  out  those  great  fundamental  industries  to  which 
alone  we  can  look  for  that  success  in  the  war  in  which  we  are  now 
engaged  without  which  railroad  stocks  and  bonds,  Government 


14 

bonds,  and  property  of  all  descriptions  must  lose  two-thirds  of  their 
present  value. 

The  men  most  active  in  the  work  of  destruction  are,  strangely 
enough,  precisely  those  whose  real  and  permanent  interests  should 
lead  them  in  the  opposite  direction — the  representatives  of  trans- 
Mississippi  roads.  Of  all  our  people  they  are  those  who  should 
most  desire  to  promote  immigration,  and  yet  they  close  their  eyes 
to  the  fact  that  immigration  grows  with  development  of  our  mineral 
resources  and  declines  as  furnaces  are  blown  out  and  rolling  mills 
are  closed.  Of  all,  they  should  most  desire  that  existing  railroad 
property  should  be  productive,  yet  do  they  close  their  eyes  to  the 
fact  that  such  property  has  always  declined  in  value  as  furnaces  and 
mills  were  closed,  and  grown  again  as  mills  were  once  again  opened, 
and  as  furnaces  were  built.  Of  all,  they  should  most  desire  that  a 
low  price  of  foreign  iron  should  operate  as  a  check  upon  our  iron- 
masters, yet  do  they  close  their  eyes  to  the  fact  that  such  iron  has 
always  fallen  in  price  as  domestic  competition  has  grown,  and  risen 
again  as  soon  as  they  and  others  like  them  had  succeeded  in 
enabling  the  "  wealthy  English  capitalists"  to  destroy  that  compe- 
tition. Of  all,  they  are  those  who  have  suffered  most  and  learned 
the  least. 

It  was  under  the  protective  tariff  of  1828  that  immigration  first 
became  a  matter  of  much  importance.  Furnaces  were  then  built, 
internal  commerce  grew  rapidly,  farmers  became  rich,  transporters 
were  well  rewarded  for  their  services,  immigration  trebled  in  its 
amount,  and  American  competition  compelled  the  British  iron- 
masters to  furnish  iron  at  a  moderate  price. 

Eight  years  later  all  this  was  changed,  the  American  makers  of 
roads  and  of  iron  being  both  together  ruined,  labor  being  every- 
where in  excess  of  the  demand,  and  immigration  remaining  sta- 
tionary at  a  point  but  little  higher  than  it  had  so  promptly  reached 
in  1834. 

Eight  years  still  later  we  find  that  under  protection  the  produc- 
tion of  iron  had  trebled,  thereby  making  such  demand  for  labor  as 
to  have  carried  the  number  of  immigrants  up  to  little  short  of 
300,000. 

At  the  close  of  another  period  of  similar  length,  passed  under 
the  free  trade  system,  we  find  labor  to  have  been  in  excess  of  demand 
while  railroad  owners  were  being  ruined,  and  immigration  to  have 
so  far  declined  as  to  have  ceased  to  merit  much  consideration. 


15 

Again,  in  .1865,  we  have  reached  a  period  of  some  protection  to 
the  greatest  of  all  the  industries  of  the  world.  Labor  is,  therefore, 
in  demand.  Immigration  grows,  and  with  it  the  value  of  railroad 
stock,  while  British  iron  is  very  cheap. 

The  close  connection  that  here  is  shown  to  exist  between  immi- 
gration and  protection,  as  well  as  between  prosperity  and  a  low 
price  of  British  iron,  ought  surely  to  be  sufficient  to  satisfy  our 
trans-Mississippi  friends  of  the  absolute  necessity  that  exists  for 
giving  to  the  great  departments  of  industry  that  certain  protection 
which  is  required  for  securing  a  rapid  increase  in  the  domestic  com- 
petition for  supplying  the  market  with  coal,  paper,  leather,  and  iron 
of  all  descriptions.  They  have  land  in  abundance,  and  their  mineral 
wealth  is  great  beyond  all  calculation.  What  they  need  is  power. 
To  obtain  that  they  must  have  men  to  mine  their  coal  and  their  ore, 
to  build  engines,  to  clear  their  lands,  and  to  make  their  roads.  Men 
come  always  when  we  have  protection.  They  fly  from  us  always 
when  we  are  subjected  to  the  British  free  trade  system.  Can  they 
not,  then,  see  that  all  their  real  and  permanent  interests  are  in  per- 
fect harmony  with  those  of  the  older  States  ?  Must  they  be  once 
more  "  brayed"  in  the  free  trade  "  mortar"  before  they  will  come 
to  understand  these  things  ? 

So  much  for  the  past,  and  now,  for  moment,  let  us  look  to  the 
future.  To  all  appearances  it  will  be  needed,  within  a  very  brief 
period,  to  relay  all  the  southern  roads,  and  there  will  be  need  for 
hundreds  of  thousands  of  tons  of  rails.  Are  we  preparing  for  this? 
Are  we  now  building  furnaces  and  rolling  mills  ?  We  are  not  I  On 
the  contrary,  they  are  being  closed,  even  the  present  taxes,  as  com- 
pared with  the  duties  on  that  made  abroad,  being  so  oppressive  that 
the  work  of  manufacture  can  no  longer  be  carried  on  with  any 
profit.  It  is  seen,  too,  that  the  nearer  we  approach  a  gold  value 
the  heavier  become  the  internal  taxes,  and  the  more  does  the  foreign 
manufacturer  tend  to  become  protected  against  the  domestic  one. 
Let  this  continue  but  a  little  longer,  and  let  occasion  arise  for  laying 
those  Southern  roads,  and  what  then  will  be  the  price  of  British 
iron  ?  Cannot  our  railroad  managers  see  that,  in  pursuing  their 
present  course,  they  are  not  only  "  killing  the  goose  that  lays  the 
golden  egg,"  but  also  providing  for  subjecting  themselves  to  a  taxa- 
tion for  the  benefit  of  our  British  friends  that,  combined  with  the 
loss  of  the  domestic  traffic,  must  cause  the  price  of  their  stock  to 
fall  again  to  the  low  price  at  which  it  stood  in  1857  ?  Cannot 


16 

they  see  that  now,  as  always  heretofore,  they  are  playing  cards  that 
have  been  placed  in  their  hands  by  men  whose  one  great  object  in 
life  is  that  of  having  food  and  labor  cheap  while  iron  is  maintained 
at  the  highest  price  ?  Can  they  not  see  that  the  objects  they  should 
always  have  in  view  are  directly  the  reverse  of  this,  their  prosperity 
coming  always  with  rise  in  the  profits  of  the  farmer  and  in  the 
wages  of  the  laborer,  and  decline  in  the  price  of  iron  ?  They  are 
now  laboring  to  arrest  the  growing  tendency  to  emigration  from 
the  shores  of  Europe;  and  yet,  every  man  who  can  be  attracted  here 
becomes,  from  the  moment  of  his  arrival,  a  contributor  to  their 
revenues,  while  preparing,  by  means  of  procreation,  for  a  further  in- 
crease in  the  number  of  such  contributors,  and  in  the  powers  of  each 
and  all. 

It  is  surely  time  that  our  railroad  managers  should  awaken  to 
the  fact  that  their  interests  are  so  perfectly  in  harmony  with  those 
of  the  men  who  mine  coal  and  make  iron  that  every  blow  levelled 
at  the  latter  tells  directly  upon  themselves.  When  they  shall  do 
so — when  they  shall  have  arrived  at  the  conclusion  that  these  two 
great  interests  should  stand  shoulder  to  shpulder  with  each  other, 
and  that  an  enlightened  self-interest  ought  to  prompt  them  to  aid 
in  securing  the  adoption  of  measures  looking  to  the  incorporation 
of  home-grown  food  in  every  yard  of  cloth,  every  ream  of  paper, 
and  every  hide  of  leather  consumed  on  this  side  of  the  Atlantic — we 
shall  then  at  length  be  fairly  on  the  road  toward  finding  how  it  is 
that  we  may  outdo  England  without  fighting  her. 

Sincerely  hoping  that  the  day  may  not  be  far  distant  when  all 
this  shall  be  done,  and  when  our  people  shall,  to  use  the  words  of 
Jackson,  become  a  little  more  Americanized,  I  remain,  my  dear 
sir,  with  great  regard  and  respect, 

Yours  very  truly, 

HENRY  C.  CAREY. 

Hon.   SCHTJYLER  COLFAX. 
PHILADELPHIA,  February  10,  1865. 


2/4 


DATE  DUE 


MAN  I  a  ioo> 

y 

BPPI 

[  JAN  27 

- 

1982 
i 

-• 

j 

CAYLORO 

PRINTED  IN  U.S.A. 

3  1970  0(3480  4297 


A     000  495  859     1 


